“Resolved, 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.” These words were penned by Richard Henry Lee of Virginia, before Thomas Jefferson even took pen to paper. (Presented to Congress on June 7, 1776) It was part of a move by the Continental Congress to ride the current of national discontent, which had been stirred by the publication of Thomas Paine’s “Common Sense”. Furthermore, across the colonies, from the level of colonial legislature down to individual judges, Americans had been declaring themselves free of the rule of King George III beginning in April, 1776.The driving force for independence was the refusal to pay taxes to help Great Britain balance the debt it had incurred during the French and Indian Wars. It seems a bit ungrateful, that the colonists, who depended upon the mother country to protect them from the depredations of the eastern forest natives and their French provocateurs, should resist paying the bills. But from the English point of view, the stamp tax and tea tax were appropriate measures to help them raise revenue to balance the books. In the years leading to the battles of Lexington and Concord in April, 1775, resistance solidified behind the slogan: “No Taxation Without Representation.”
The writing of the actual declaration is shrouded in myth. Fact: on June 11, 1776, John Adams , Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, Robert R. Livingston, and Roger Sherman were selected to be a “Committee of Five”, to draft a declaration of independence. After a discussion of principles, the committee selected Thomas Jefferson to compose a working document, written in seventeen days (or less), and presented to Congress on June 28, 1776. After a week of debate, on July 2, the resolution for independence was passed with twelve affirmative votes and one abstention. A great wave had crashed upon the rocks, making history, declaring that “all men are created equal.”