“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 affect 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… is a history of repeated
injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an
absolute Tyranny over… To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
“[The Speaker of the House] has refused his Assent
to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good. He has forbidden
his [House] 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 [controlled the House of] Representatives… 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…”
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