3.2: The Declaration of Independence

Before America became an independent country, it was a set of 13 British colonies established between 1607 and 1732. The first inhabitants of these colonies included European entrepreneurs looking to make or grow their fortunes in the New World, religious outcasts fleeing persecution, native peoples who saw their territory decrease in size as the new settlements became larger and more numerous, and slaves bought or captured in Africa and shipped across the Atlantic Ocean.

By the 1770s, over two million people lived in colonial America. They were governed by the British parliament and by decrees of the King of Great Britain, George III. The colonials generally saw themselves as British subjects (which they were) but a distinctly American culture had begun to emerge.

Being ruled by a distant King and Parliament displeased the colonials. The British Crown taxed the colonies heavily to pay off its war debts and imposed many economic and political restrictions. Unlike British subjects in Great Britain, the colonials had no voting representation in Parliament with which to influence or block these laws. Popular sovereignty was lacking: the colonials were ruled by a government that gave them no formal say and ignored their appeals for relief from its harmful policies.

After many failed attempts to persuade King George III to address their concerns, the colonials took extreme action. On July 4, 1776, the Second Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence, a document written mainly by Thomas Jefferson. Over the next month, delegates from all 13 colonies signed the Declaration.

Most of the Declaration (which you can find beginning on page 177) consisted of a tally of the colonials’ grievances against the King. He had failed to pass laws the colonies wanted or allow colonial governments to pass them in his name. He controlled the appointment of colonial judges, causing them to be biased in favor of the Crown. He stationed many British troops in the colonies even during peacetime, forcing colonials to provide them free room and board. He imposed burdensome taxes on the colonials, who had no formal recourse to influence those taxes.

The Declaration of Independence was highly critical of King George III, whom it labeled a tyrant. However, most of its complaints were not specific to King George III. The colonials could have demanded that he abdicate and allow himself to be replaced by a better ruler. Instead, they made it clear that it didn’t matter who was King: the problems were rooted in the British monarchy itself. The only sensible solution in the colonials’ view was “to throw off such government”—to declare their independence—and “to institute new government” to avoid these problems in the future.

In the opinion of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, America was already independent even before the ink had dried on the parchment. From the King’s perspective, America was simply a rebellious region that needed to be reminded who was in charge. The American Revolutionary War was fought between the two sides to settle this dispute. Had the colonials lost, the British Crown would have restored control and the Declaration would have gone down in history as the treasonous spark of a failed insurrection. Instead, the colonials—henceforth the Americans— won the war. In 1783, Great Britain acknowledged its defeat by signing the Treaty of Paris, affirming that the United States was a free and independent nation.

When the 56 men whose names appear at the bottom of the Declaration of Independence declared “we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor,” it was not just a figure of speech. They knew war was coming, and that if they lost they would have signed their own death warrants by adding their names to the Declaration.

With the benefit of hindsight, it’s easy for us to envision ourselves confidently signing our names alongside theirs with untrembling hands. We tend to underestimate the courage it took to do what they did. We, unlike them, never had to imagine our own necks in a traitor’s noose.