Declaration of Independence Chapter 6. Common Sense By the winter of 1775, the Patriots had been fighting Britain for months. They were fighting to get.

Declaration of Independence

Chapter 6

Common SenseBy the winter of 1775, the Patriots had been fighting Britain

for months. They were fighting to get Britain to repeal the Intolerable

Acts and to stop taxes when they were not represented.Many colonists were still reluctant to make the war about

independence and cut their ties with Britain.

A pamphlet written by Thomas Paine and published in 1776 changed that. It was called Common Sense.

I offer nothing more than

simple facts, plain

arguments, and common

sense . . .

In Common Sense, Thomas Paine, urged colonists to cut their ties with Britain.

1. He said that the idea of having monarchs was wrong.

Paine made his argument against British rule in two main points:

There is something exceedingly ridiculous in

the composition of Monarchy; it first excludes a man from the means of

information, yet empowers him to act in cases where the highest judgment is

required.

Hereditary succession has no claim. For all men being originally equals, no one by birth could have the right to set up his own family in perpetual preference to all others

forever, and tho’ himself might deserve some decent degree of honors of his cotemporaries, yet his descendants might be far too

unworthy to inherit them.

2. Paine said that the colonists did not owe anything to Britain because any help that the British had given to the colonies was done so for their own profit.

Small islands not capable of protecting themselves are

the proper objects for kingdoms to take under their care; but there is

something very absurd in supposing a continent to be perpetually governed by an

island.

Common Sense changed many colonists minds on the idea of independence and it also changed many of the delegates to the Continental Congress minds as well.

The delegates faced a difficult decision. Once they declared independence there would be no turning back they would be traitors to Britain and if caught they would be hanged.

Richard Henry Lee of Virginia introduced the idea of independence to Congress in June 1776.

Declaration of Independence

• The Continental Congress set up a committee to draw up a formal declaration of independence.– Thomas Jefferson– John Adams– Benjamin Franklin– Roger Sherman– Robert Livingston

Sherman Franklin Jefferson Adams Livingston

• Thomas Jefferson was chosen to draft the declaration.

• Jefferson was chosen because he was a good writer, he was well respected and he was from Virginia.

• Franklin and Adams added some points to Declaration before presenting it to the Continental Congress on July 2, 1776

• Congress debated the Declaration and made some revisions, such as taking out the slavery clause.

• Congress voted to accept the Declaration on July 4, 1776.

• John Hancock, the president of the Continental Congress, signed the Declaration first.

Benjamin

Franklin

Thomas Jefferson

John Adams

John Hancock

Roger Sherman

Robert Livingston

Richard Henry Lee

• Preamble: introduction to the Declaration

“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.”

Main part #1Natural Rights

• This section describes the rights that belong to all people from birth and why we have governments.

“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.”

Truths self-evident

endowedunalienable

“That, to secure these Rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their

just Powers from the Consent of the Governed.”

• People form governments in order to protect their natural rights and liberties.

• These governments can only exist if the people have given them this power.

• If a government does not protect the natural rights of the people then they have the right to abolish that government and set up a new government.

“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.

•You should not rebel for “light and transient” causes – you should not rebel for the little things

•Man is more likely to continue to live in sufferable terms because they are used to it then to right the situation by rebelling.

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 they duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security.

•When a government is abusing its people it is the people right and duty to overthrow that government and provide security for the people

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 the 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.

•The colonies have suffered at the hand of the King of Great Britain.

•We will prove how….

Main part #2British Wrongs

• The second part of the Declaration lists the wrongs that led the Americans to break away from Britain.

• All of the blame is put on the King of Britain, King George III.

• Problems with Great Britain:– Not allowing colonial legislatures to meet– Limiting the trade of the colonies– Taxes without the consent of the people– Quartering troops

The Declaration lists 27 grievances with the king.

•The colonists had petitioned the king to correct these injustices yet nothing changed. •And a ruler who did this was a tyrant and not fit to rule.

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.

Main part #3Independence

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 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….

• The last part of the Declaration announces that the colonies are the United States of America.

• They cut all political ties with Britain.

• They appeal to the world to recognize them as an independent nation.