While it may look like the path to the Declaration of Independence was inevitable in the 1770s, the American colonists did not think so. In fact, as late as the spring of 1775, there was general resistance to the idea. But despite American reconciliation, the British acted with disdain toward any American efforts. Over the course of 1775 and early 1776, the possibility of a peaceful solution became less likely. In the wake of Lexington and Concord, the king and Parliament began to refer to the Americans as “traitors,” “enemies,” and “rebels” involved in “conspiracy.” The British went so far as to issue the Prohibitory Act, which brought all trade with the colonies to a halt.
But even as late as the spring of 1776, there was hesitation. In Conceived in Liberty, Murray Rothbard explains that the Continental Congress recognized its limited ability to declare independence for the whole without getting permission from the colonies, even if all of the representatives were on board with it. This limitation was not insignificant. The delegates at the Continental Congress understood that their efforts were not those of one amalgamated union, but the work of their home colonies.
Because the conflict with Britain was focused in New England, those colonies were ready for independence in early 1776. But there was still resistance in the middle and Southern colonies. The reason, Rothbard argues, was that commitment to the crown seemed to overshadow the conflict with Parliament.
Rothbard points to Thomas Paine and Common Sense as a key factor for many colonists in attacking the king in order to “smash the icon” of the monarchy. In Common Sense, Paine argued for independence and, in a new line of attack, specifically aimed his frustration at the king. Using both biblical and Enlightenment arguments, he attacked not just King George III, but the very idea of a monarch. Governments, particularly monarchies, had become conquerors and plunderers, not defenders and protectors of natural rights. Common Sense was so successful that many were filled with new energy to pursue independence.
Despite the delays, on July 4, 1776, the Declaration of Independence was approved after several revisions to Jefferson’s draft. The united colonies were now united states.
The Declaration of Independence should be understood not merely as a statement of natural rights but as the formal declaration of sovereignty by 13 independent states. Reading the Declaration in light of the Articles of Confederation, the debates over ratification, and Jefferson’s later writings reveals a consistent understanding of the union as a compact among sovereign states rather than the creation of a single consolidated nation.
The Declaration
The Declaration of Independence has three major parts. The first part, the Preamble, comprising two paragraphs, explains the justification of declaring independence. The second part is a long list of violations of the rights of the American people, with the blame directly placed on George III. In the final paragraph, we have the actual declaration of independence and sovereignty for the 13 united states. While we remember the first couple of paragraphs the most, it is in the last paragraph where the declaration happens. We are going to survey the entire document, noting key elements along the way. Our first goal is to understand often referenced lines in their context. Then, we will see that the weight of the document is at the end, with the actual declaration, and consider what this means for the significance of the Declaration.
Remember that the colonies, now the states, not only needed to declare independence, but also needed to win the support of other nations, particularly France. Thomas Paine, in Common Sense, had suggested that a declaration that explained the foundations and abuses that demanded a call for independence and was sent to foreign courts would be more effective than shiploads of pleas to Britain. It seems as if it was with that in mind that Thomas Jefferson crafted the Declaration. This would be a declaration, to be sure, but one that appealed to foreign sympathies.
Note, first, the declaration that this is a “unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America.” Note the plurality. No single, national, centralized government is being declared here. In fact, this is not a governing document in any meaningful way. What is being declared in reality is the independence of 13 states that are joining together for this purpose.
Now, notice how Jefferson rooted this not in British or English rights, but in universal rights. Jefferson’s statement that “all men are created equal” was both the foundation for this declaration and a passage whose meaning is intensely debated. Of course, Jefferson was not saying that everyone is equal in every capacity— physically, mentally, monetarily. There is a wide range of difference and inequality that is certainly “self-evident,” perhaps more so than the equality that Jefferson says is so obvious.
So, what did Jefferson mean when he said that all men are created equal? Since he follows John Locke, he would seem to be arguing that in the so-called state of nature everyone would be equal not only in their rights, but also in their status. But we do not live in a state of nature. We exist in a society. Over the course of time, rank and order develop out of the fact of people’s capacity, effort, and skill, and out of the conditions into which they were born, for good or for ill. But Jefferson was contending that every person is still entitled to basic rights, specifically life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Rothbard, offering his commentary on the Declaration in Conceived in Liberty, says that Jefferson did not intend to communicate that everyone had a “right to an equal income” or “the absurdity that everyone is equal in capacity or natural endowments.” Rather, he was saying that they were by nature equally free and independent, echoing the words of the Virginia Declaration of Rights.
What did he mean by the pursuit of happiness? If he had quoted Locke directly, he would have probably used the word property. It seems that Jefferson wanted to expand the notion of this in view of the fact that it was not just the property itself, but also the means and methods one might use to acquire and keep it, specifically one’s work. That is, that people would be able to use themselves and their property for their goals and purposes.
Jefferson argued that governments existed for the purpose of securing and protecting these rights. Rothbard said that he meant, “in short, [that] the right to pursue happiness includes and implies the right to acquire and possess property.”
But Jefferson contended that whenever a government not only failed to protect those rights, but became an aggressor toward them, the people under its power had the right to get rid of the government. When they did so, they had the right to institute a new government which would, in their view, be as effective as possible in protecting these rights. He did urge caution, though. He knew that in the period between that abolition and the institution of a new government there was the potential for great suffering.
However, Jefferson insisted that at some point, it was not only a people’s right but their duty and responsibility, for themselves and for the future, to throw off a despotic and tyrannical government and to provide “new Guards for their future security.” Jefferson explained that the current circumstances of the American colonies were those of a people who had the right to such alterations.
Notice that Jefferson goes directly for the king. Considering the conflicts of the previous couple of decades, it would seem that Jefferson should have been attacking Parliament. But Jefferson never thought Parliament had any jurisdiction over the colonies in the first place. From the very beginning, the colonies had established their own representative assemblies that would direct affairs locally. The colonies did, in his view, owe loyalty to the king, but Parliament, in every act of regulation, taxation, and legislation over the colonies acted outside its jurisdiction. There was no need to declare independence from Parliament. The colonies had never been subject to it.
The king was another matter. Jefferson, in an effort to let “a candid world” see his case, lists more than two dozen complaints. While one might point to many of these complaints as acts of Parliament and not of the king, Jefferson would contend that the king was ultimately responsible because he was allowing Parliament to act without legitimate authority.
Jefferson explains that despite all of these “oppressions,” as he called them, the colonies had pleaded for help. But they had been ignored and the abuse intensified. As a result, Jefferson concluded that the king was not fit to rule.
Now, finally, we come to the concluding paragraph. Notice that it was the representatives of the states that declared that the states (again, note the plural) are rightfully free and independent. Each one, as a free and independent state, could conduct themselves as such. That meant they had war powers, the right to establish commerce, and more. To Jefferson the states were more than just a division of a centralized nation. They were not just administrative districts. They were independent and free, on par with the other states of the world.
Certainly, this document brought the colonies closer together. But Jefferson was careful in his description. In Conceived in Liberty, Rothbard says, “This philosophy brought the separate states closer together by providing a common revolutionary ideology.”
Echoes of the Declaration in the Early Republic
In the wake of the Declaration, the Continental Congress adopted the Articles of Confederation in 1777. It did not go into force, officially, until 1781, but it was the guiding document for the congress through the War of Independence. The articles, which the United States replaced with the Constitution in 1789, are helpful because they demonstrate the new states’ posture toward the union that had been created.
Perhaps the most revealing articles are the second and third. Article II insisted that every state retained “sovereignty, freedom and independence, and every Power, Jurisdiction and right, which is not by this confederation expressly delegated to the United States, in Congress assembled.” Though the central government certainly had some responsibilities, the weight of authority and duty fell to the states. This is significant because it reflects that the states, first, were not automatically part of a centralized union. Rather, they had to join themselves to one. In addition, even when they did, they did not meld into a centralized nation and become administrative districts. Rather, they maintained their power and independence.
Article III is significant because it reflects what the Articles of Confederation were intended to create. Here, it is called a “league of friendship,” and its responsibilities are framed in precisely the natural rights and social contract terms that Jefferson used in the Declaration. The league of friendship was intended to protect the states from outside dangers and for the “security of their Liberties.”
Even when the Articles of Confederation were in the process of being replaced, those who pushed back against the Constitution rooted many of their arguments in the ideas and principles that were addressed in the Declaration. Reading the papers of Brutus and other anti-Federalists reveals their concerns about centralized power, the protection of rights, and the consent of the governed.
In Brutus no. 1, perhaps the most famous of the Anti-Federalist Papers, the author also commented on the nature of the various states. When he referred to the United States, he appealed to the fact that the “nation,” as it stood, was composed of states that were characterized by a variety of climates, production means, and political, social, and religious priorities. He insisted that because their laws and conditions were “diverse, and in some opposite,” they should be able to manage their own affairs. He explained that if one centralized government pushed for a specific law it would be doing so over a nation composed of people with “heterogeneous and discordant principles” who, as a result, would be constantly “contending with each other.” His fundamental objection, he concluded, was that it created a “whole union into one government.” That was in violation of what the United States were as a result of the War of Independence.
Finally, in consideration of the status of the states in the early years of the nation, we should consider the Bill of Rights as the answer to those who objected to the centralization of power. The Ninth Amendment, rooted in concerns similar to the Declaration’s, makes it clear that the list of rights included in the Bill of Rights is not an exhaustive list of all the rights that a person possesses. The Tenth Amendment reserves any powers not specifically granted to the central government for the states or for the people. With these amendments, the Bill of Rights echoes the sentiments of the Declaration, not only regarding the natural rights of people, but also the power of the state.
Jefferson’s Reflections on the Declaration
It is no secret that the words of the Declaration have been used to legitimize social and political movements throughout American history. Many have framed Jefferson’s ideas as a radical departure from what had come before. These statements of natural rights, and the right to break away from a government that violated these rights might seem new and original to us. But in a May 8, 1825, letter to Henry Lee, Jefferson seems to rein in the radicalism that many have read into the document:
“When forced, therefore, to resort to arms for redress, an appeal to the tribunal of the world was deemed proper for our justification. This was the object of the Declaration of Independence. Not to find out new principles, or new arguments, never before thought of, not merely to say things which had never been said before; but to place before mankind the common sense of the subject, in terms so plain and firm as to command their assent, and to justify ourselves in the independent stand we are compelled to take. Neither aiming at originality of principle or sentiment, nor yet copied from any particular and previous writing, it was intended to be an expression of the American mind, and to give to that expression the proper tone and spirit called for by the occasion. All its authority rests then on the harmonizing sentiments of the day, whether expressed in conversation, in letters, printed essays, or in the elementary books of public right, as Aristotle, Cicero, Locke, Sidney, etc. The historical documents which you mention as in your possession, ought all to be found, and I am persuaded you will find, to be corroborative of the facts and principles advanced in that Declaration.”
There are a few key elements of note here, first, Jefferson’s reason for writing the Declaration.
The Continental Congress deemed it necessary to justify the colonies’ efforts to the “tribunal of the world.” This was, as much as anything, an appeal to other nations for support in the efforts the colonies were, as Jefferson described it, “compelled to take.”
In addition, Jefferson argued that the Declaration’s arguments were not intended to be original. Rather, he explains, they rested on the long history of those who have made the case for natural rights. Of course, the Declaration was an effort to bring those contributions together and advance those ideas, but Jefferson did not consider the Declaration to be out of step with the legacy of the call for the rights and responsibilities of people and how they should respond to a tyrannical government.
To be sure, Jefferson may have been doing something more radical than he appreciated. Reflecting on the Founders’ efforts, Gordon Wood explains that Americans thought their efforts were “not to create new liberties but to preserve old ones.” However, Wood contends that men like Jefferson were “mistaken” in thinking that is all they were doing. These principles, according to Wood, were indeed revolutionary. Yes, they drew from older sources, but he insists that in the Declaration, Americans were not defending only their rights, but were engaged in a “worldwide struggle for the salvation of liberty itself.” Wood argues that the American efforts were much more expansive than perhaps they considered. He quotes Thomas Paine in Common Sense, who described America as the “asylum for mankind” in the face of an “old world” that was “overrun with oppression” and where “freedom was hunted” and in places like Africa and Asia was “expelled” and even in Europe was considered a “stranger.” Even in England, Paine thought, freedom had been given a “warning to depart.” But things could be different in America.
Considering the Declaration in Conceived in Liberty, Rothbard says that Jefferson was not aiming to be original but rather was trying to summarize the American attitude toward the British crown. Rothbard called it “a superb epitome of the libertarian naturalrights philosophy propelling the Revolution as well as the specific grievance that had roused the American people.” He also notes that the document indicated that the colonies were free and independent states, echoing Richard Henry Lee’s resolution from a couple of days before. Original or not, “Jefferson’s words,” as Dumas Malone put it, “should make tyranny tremble in any age.”
When we consider Jefferson’s views on the Declaration, we ought to keep in mind how he understood the relationship between the states, the central government, and the rights that were to be protected by the centralized power. In the wake of John Adams’s Alien and Sedition Acts (1798), Thomas Jefferson and James Madison wrote the Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions (1798–99). A brief overview of them reveals that both Jefferson and Madison framed the issue in terms very similar to those of the Declaration. While they did not break away or declare independence, the resolutions certainly emphasized the central government’s duty to protect rights, not violate them, pointed out its failures in that regard, and maintained the right of the states to stand up against such usurpations. The resolutions also emphasized that the Constitution was a compact. In other words, they emphasized the states’ agreement and their right to leave the union if necessary. This is in contrast to conceptions of the Constitution that insist states gave up the right to exit. The Kentucky Resolutions, authored by Jefferson, even went so far as to appeal to the “co-States,” as it referred to them, to stand up against federal government overreach and left room for states to act to bring a halt to these abuses.
Misreadings of the Declaration
The Declaration of Independence remains one of the most influential documents in American political thought. Its 250th anniversary is an opportunity not only to celebrate the Declaration but also to reconsider what it actually accomplished.
A careful reading of the document suggests that its immediate purpose was to announce the separation of the 13 colonies from the British Empire by declaring them to be “Free and Independent States.” The Declaration was, first and foremost, an act of secession. It announced the dissolution of the political ties that had bound the colonies to Great Britain and asserted the sovereignty of each state.
Nevertheless, many later interpreters have understood the Declaration differently. Rather than viewing it as a declaration of independence by 13 sovereign states, they have treated it as the birth certificate of a single American nation founded upon the proposition that all men are created equal. There is no question that the United States eventually developed into a nation possessing a far stronger central government than existed in 1776. The historical question, however, is whether that understanding accurately reflects the political order established by the Declaration itself.
The evidence considered throughout this essay suggests otherwise. The Declaration did not establish a national government. It did not create a consolidated political society. Rather, it declared the independence of 13 states that had united for the common purpose of separating from Great Britain while retaining their individual political existence.
This distinction matters because later interpretations have often read subsequent constitutional developments back into the Declaration itself. Doing this risks obscuring the political assumptions that informed the document in its original historical context.
One of the clearest examples appears in Abraham Lincoln’s interpretation of the Declaration during the Civil War. In the Gettysburg Address, Lincoln described the nation as having been “conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.” He further characterized the Civil War as a test of whether that nation, “so conceived and so dedicated,” could long endure.
Lincoln’s reading profoundly shaped subsequent American political thought. By treating the Declaration as the founding of a single nation rather than as the declaration of independence by separate states, his interpretation offered a different understanding of the American founding than that reflected in the Declaration’s own language.
But as seen in this essay, the Declaration itself did not describe the creation of a consolidated nation. Instead, it announced that 13 independent states were assuming “the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them.” The emphasis falls upon separation from Great Britain and the sovereignty of the individual states.
Recognizing this distinction, that the Declaration of Independence did not create the centralized union which developed later, but was the declaration of 13 sovereign states, allows the Declaration to be read within its own historical context rather than through the lens of later constitutional controversies. It reminds us that the document addressed immediate political circumstances while also articulating enduring principles concerning natural rights, legitimate government, and the right of a people to resist tyranny.
As Americans commemorate the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, the document deserves to be read as its authors intended: as both a universal defense of natural rights and as a formal declaration by 13 free and independent states that they were assuming their place among the nations of the earth.
