WHEN in the Course of human events, it be- comes 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 man- kind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
1 The delegates of the United Colonies of New Hampshire; Mas- sachusetts Bay; Rhode Island and Providence Plantations; Con- necticut; New York; New Jersey; Pennsylvania; New Castle, Kent, and Sussex, in Delaware; Maryland; Virginia; North Caro- lina, and South Carolina, In Congress assembled at Philadelphia, Resolved on the 10th of May, 1776, to recommend to the respec- tive assemblies and conventions of the United Colonies, where no government sufficient to the exigencies of their affairs had been established, to adopt such a government as should, in the opin- ion of the representatives of the people, best conduce to the hap- piness and safety of their constituents in particular, and of America in general. A preamble to this resolution, agreed to on the 15th of May, stated the intention to be totally to suppress the exercise of every kind of authority under the British crown. On the 7th of June, certain resolutions respecting independency were moved and seconded. On the 10th of June it was resolved, that a committee should be appointed to prepare a declaration to the following effect: ''That the United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States; that they are ab- solved from all allegiance to the British crown; and that all po- litical connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved.'' /j