Thought for Friday, Jul 3, 1998 (fwd)

[Peter Milbury <pmilbury@ERICIR.SYR.EDU>]

Dear LM_NET Colleagues,

Food for thought:

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Fri, 3 Jul 1998 04:05:01 -0500
From: Dan Galvin <galvin@unix.tamu.edu>
To: TFTD-L@TAMU.EDU
Subject: Thought for Friday, Jul  3, 1998

The Declaration of Independence of the Thirteen Colonies

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
shewn, 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 [George III] 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 meantime 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 for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing
to pass others to encourage their migrations 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 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
complete the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun
with circumstances of cruelty and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the
most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy 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 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 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.

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