THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE

WHEN in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to
dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to
assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to
which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect
to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes
which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,
that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights,
that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. That to
secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their
just powers from the consent of the governed, that whenever any form of
government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people
to alter or to abolish it, and to institute a new government, laying its
foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to
them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not
be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience
hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are
sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they
are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing
invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute
despotism, it is their right, it is their duty to throw off such
government, and to provide new guards for their future security

In every stage of these oppressions we have petitioned for redress in the
most humble terms: our repeated petitions have been answered only by
repeated injury. A prince, whose character is thus marked by every act
which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people . . .

Nor have we been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have
warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an
unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the
circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to
their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties
of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably
interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to
the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in
the necessity, which denounces our separation, and hold them as we hold the
rest of mankind, enemies in war, in peace friends.

We, therefore, the representatives of the United States of America, in
General Congress, assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world
for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the name, and by the authority
of the good people of these colonies, solemnly publish and declare, that
these united colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent
states; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown,
and that all political connections between them and the state of Great
Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as free and
independent states, they have full power to levy war, conclude peace,
contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things
which independent states may of right do.

And for the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on the
protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our
lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.

- -- Adopted in Congress July 4, 1776

Checked-by: Richard Lake