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And, as the first successful declaration of independence in world history, its example helped to inspire countless movements for independence, self-determination, and revolution after 1776.
- Overview
- Causes
- Effects
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On April 19, 1775, the Battles of Lexington and Concord initiated armed conflict between Great Britain and the 13 North American colonies (the nucleus of the future United States of America).
At that time few of the colonists consciously desired to separate from Britain. But as the American Revolution proceeded during 1775–76, Britain undertook to assert its sovereignty by means of large armed forces, making only a gesture toward conciliation.
Increasingly, the majority of Americans came to believe that they must secure their rights outside the British Empire.
The losses and restrictions that came from the war greatly widened the breach between the colonies and the mother country.
The Declaration of Independence put forth the doctrines of natural rights and of government under social contract.
The document claimed that Parliament never truly possessed sovereignty over the colonies and that George III had persistently violated the agreement between himself as governor and the Americans as the governed.
When the Declaration was adopted, racing horsemen and the noise of cannon fire carried the news far and wide. General George Washington had the document read to the army, and its ringing sentences strengthened the morale of his troops.
The Declaration helped unify the colonies so that they all fought together instead of trying to make separate peace agreements with Britain.
Some of the phrases of the declaration have steadily exerted profound influence in the United States, especially the proclamation, “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.” Although the meanings of these phrases, together with conclusions drawn from them, have been endlessly debated, the declaration has served to justify the extension of American political and social democracy.
The Declaration has also inspired revolutionary movements outside the United States.
Jul 4, 2017 · The first significant impact was at the beginning of the war, before the Declaration of Independence was even a twinkle in Thomas Jefferson’s eye. “Dear Catherine of Russia. May I please have 20,000 troops to crush American freedom. Regards, George.” “You go to war with the army you’ve got.”
This can be done for the Declaration in a number of ways: by showing that it was the product of a pressing international context in 1776; by examining the host of imitations it spawned and the many analogous documents that have been issued from 1790 to 1988; and by comparing the starkly different histories of its present reception within and bey...
The Declaration was written to justify the independence of the early American republic. But its message of unalienable rights, equality and liberty have echoed through time and across borders.
Apr 1, 2004 · Accordingly, this essay will deal with the immediate motivations that led to the Declaration in 1776, with the first fifty years of reactions to it, at home and abroad, and with the subsequent history of declaring independence across the world from Venezuela to New Zealand.
The Declaration of Independence was written largely by Jefferson, who had displayed talent as a political philosopher and polemicist in his A Summary View of the Rights of British America, published in 1774. At the request of his fellow committee members he wrote the first draft. The members of the committee made a number of merely semantic ...
