The Declaration of Independence of the United States of America Thomas Jefferson 6283 downloads.pdf

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Title: The Declaration of Independence of the United States of America

Author: Thomas Jefferson

Release date: December 1, 1971 [eBook #1]
Most recently updated: September 2, 2025

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1

Credits: This etext was produced by Michael S. Hart.

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE
DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE OF THE UNITED STATES OF
AMERICA ***

THE DECLARATION OF
INDEPENDENCE OF THE

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

Table of Contents

1. Introductory Notes
2. Transcribers’ Notes regarding this version of the first eBook.
3. Declaration of Independence presented in the style of an original
etext.
4. Gallery of Thomas Jefferson's Handwritten Drafts presented in
four images.

Introduction
Written by Michael S. Hart for the official re-release:

The United States Declaration of Independence was the first E-
text released by Project Gutenberg, early in 1971. The title
was stored in an emailed instruction set which required a tape
or diskpack be hand mounted for retrieval. The disk pack was
the size of a large cake in a cake carrier, cost $1500, and
contained 5 megabytes, of which this file took 1-2%. Two tape
backups were kept plus one on paper tape. The 10,000 files we
hope to have online by the end of 2001 should take about 1-2%
of a comparably priced drive in 2001.

This file was never copyrighted, Sharewared, etc., and is thus
for all to use and copy in any manner they choose. Please feel
free to make your own edition using this as a base.

In my research for creating this transcription of our first
Etext, I have come across enough discrepancies [even within
that official documentation provided by the United States] to
conclude that even "facsimiles" of the Declaration of
Independence are nary identical to the original, nor of other
"facsimiles." There is a plethora of variations in
capitalizations, punctuation, and where names appear on the
documents [which names I have left out].

The resulting document has several misspellings removed from
those parchment "facsimiles" I used back in 1971, and which I
should not be able to easily find at this time, including
"Brittain."

[JT, Apr 2005: "Brittish" is spelled as in the original.]

[RO, Aug 2025: MH's original justified text widths are restored
as closely as possible in the introduction. Minor text
alterations were made to do so.]

Transcribers’ Notes
NOTE: This file contains the original contents of the
very first eBook in the Project Gutenberg collection,
the Declaration of Independence. This file previously
contained a compilation of etexts of #1 and etext #2.
The historical variations of etext #1 are included in
the "old" subdirectory to be accessed under the "More
Files" listing in the landing page for this eBook. No
edits or changes have been made to them.

All of the original Project Gutenberg Etexts from the
1970's were produced in ALL CAPS, no lower case. The
computers we used then didn't have lower case at all.

This HTML rendition of the original etext #1 was
first produced on August 4, 2018, updated August 28,
2025. The styling used simulates the look of the
original etext, as presented on computers and
terminal displays of the era.

A table of contents and images of Thomas Jefferson's
hand-drafted copy of The Declaration of Independence
have been added to this HTML presentation.

THE
DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE
OF
THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of
America

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
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. —Such has been the patient sufferance of these
Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them
to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the
present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries
and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment
of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let
Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and
necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and
pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till
his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has
utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of
large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish
the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right
inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual,
uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public
Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance
with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing
with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to
cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative Powers,
incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large
for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time
exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and
convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States;
for that purpose obstructing the Laws of Naturalization of
Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their
migration hither, and raising the conditions of new
Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing
his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

He has made judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure
of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither
swarms of Officers to harass our People, and eat out their
substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies
without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and
superior to the Civil Power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction
foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws;
giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended legislation:

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from Punishment for any
Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these
States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us, in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by
Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended
offences:

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a
neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary

government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at
once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same
absolute rule into these Colonies:

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable
Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves
invested with Power to legislate for us in all cases
whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his
Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns,
and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large armies of foreign
mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and
tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy
scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally
unworthy of the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the
high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the
executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall
themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has
endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the
merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an
undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

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 attention 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 connection 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.

THOMAS JEFFERSON'S
HANDWRITTEN DRAFTS
The following four images are of engravings taken from Jefferson’s draft of
the Declaration of Independence, in his handwriting with emendations in
the handwritings of Benjamin Franklin and John Adams. Tapping the
"ENLARGE" button will display the image in full-size.

ENLARGE PAGE 1 ENLARGE PAGE 2 ENLARGE PAGE 3

ENLARGE PAGE 4

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