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In CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.


The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen United States of America,




WHEN in the course of human Events, it becomes 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 Mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the Separation.


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 in the Right of the People to alter or abolish it, and to institute a new Government, laying its Foundation on such Principles, and organizing its Powers in such Form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect 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 shewn, 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 King of Great-Britain is a History of repeated Injuries and Usurpations, all having in direct Object the Establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let the Facts be submitted to a candid World.


He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public Good.


He has forbidden his Governors 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 dissolved Representative Houses 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; whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the Dangers of Invasion from without, and Convulsions within.


He has endeavoured to prevent the Population of these States; for that Purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their Migrations hither, and raising the Conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.


He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.


He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the Tenure of their Offices, and Amount and Payment of their Salaries.


He has erected a Multitude of new Offices, and sent hither Swarms of Officers to harass our People, and eat out their Substance.


He has kept among us, in Times of Peace, Standing Armies, without the consent of our Legislature.


He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.


He has combined with others to subject us to a Jurisdiction foreign to our Constitution, and unacknowledged by our Laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislaton:


For quartering large Bodies of Armed Troops among us:


For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from Punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:


For cutting off our Trade with all Parts of the World:


For imposing taxes on us without our Consent:


For depriving us, in many Cases, of the Benefits of Trial by Jury:


For transporting us beyond the Seas to be tried for pretended Offences:


For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an arbitrary Government, and enlarging its Boundaries, so as to render it at once an Example and fit Instrument for introducing the same absolute Rule in these Colonies:


For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:


For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with Powers to legislate for us in all Cases whatsoever.


He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.


He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our Towns, and destroyed the Lives of our People.


He is, at this Time, transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to complete the Works of Death, Desolation, and Tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty and Perfidy, scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous Ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized Nation.


He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the Executioners of their Friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.


He has excited domestic Insurrections among us, and has endeavoured to bring on the Inhabitants of our Frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known Rule of Warfare, is an undistinguished Destruction, of all Ages, Sexes and Conditions.


In every stage of these Oppressions we have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble Terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated Injury. A Prince, whose Character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the Ruler of a free People.


Nor have we been wanting in Attentions to our British Brethren. We have warned them from Time to Time of Attempts by their Legislature to extend an unwarrantable Jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the Circumstances of our Emigration and Settlement here. We have appealed to their native Justice and Magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the Ties of our common Kindred to disavow these Usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our Connections and Correspondence. They too have been deaf to the Voice of Justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the Necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of Mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace, Friends.


We, therefore, the Representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the World for the Rectitude of our Intentions, do, in the Name, and by the Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly Publish and Declare, 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; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm Reliance on the Protection of the divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.


Signed by ORDER and
in BEHALF OF THE CONGRESS
JOHN HANCOCK,
PRESIDENT.

ATTEST.
CHARLES THOMSON,
SECRETARY.


PHILADELPHIA:
PRINTED BY JOHN DUNLAP..

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AMERICANREVOLUTION.ORG
Sullivan's Island
1776


This ironical, and burlesque old song, was composed in the early part of 1777. The author treats of the unsuccessful attack on Sullivan's Island, by the British, in the summer of the previous year, and closes his epic with promises to gain lasting fame for the royal arms, in all future actions. In the papers of the time, it appears as a "New War Song, by Sir Peter Parker," written and printed in London, and adapted to the tune, "Well met, brother Tar !"


A NEW WAR SONG


My Lords, with your leave,
An account I will give, 1
That deserves to be written in metre:
For the rebels and I,
Have been pretty nigh,
Faith almost too nigh for Sir Peter.


With much labor and toil,
Unto Sullivan's Isle, 2
I came firm as Falstaff or Pistol,
But the Yankees, 'od rot 'em,
I could not get at 'em :
Most terribly maul'd my poor Bristol. 3


Bold Clinton by land, 4
Did quietly Stand,
While I made a thundering clatter;
But the channel was deep,
So he only could peep,
And not venture over the water.


De'el take 'em, their Shot
Came so swift and so hot,
And the cowardly dogs 5 stood so stiff, sirs !
That I put ship about,
And was glad to get out,
Or they would not have left me a skiff, sirs !


Now bold as a Turk,
I proceed to New York, 6
Where with Clinton and Howe you may find me.
I've the wind in my tail,
And am hoisting my sail,
To leave Sullivan's island behind me.


But my Lords, do not fear,
For before the next year,
Although a small island could fret us,
The Continent whole,
We shall take, by my soul,
If the cowardly Yankees 7 will let us.


1 An account I will give. Late in the month of June, 1776, General Sir Henry Clinton, and Sir Peter Parker, with a powerful fleet and army, attempted the reduction of Charleston, South Carolina. The fleet came to anchor, at less than half musket shot from the fort on Sullivan's Island, and commenced the engagement. It lasted over ten hours, when the British were repulsed, after suffering great loss. After the firing ceased, the fleet slipped their cables, and before the next morning had retired two miles from the fort.


2 Sullivan's Isle is situated on the northern side of Charleston harbor, about four miles from the town.


3 Most terribly maul'd my poor Brlstol. The Bristol flag-ship, under the command of Sir Peter Parker, was greatly damaged in the hull. Commodore Parker's breeches were torn off, his thigh and knee wounded, so that he walked only when supported on each side. The following extempore appeared in the Constitutional Gazette, at New York, a short time after this action.


If "honor in the breech is lodged,"
As Hudibras has shown,
It may from thence be fairly judged,
Sir Peter's honor gone.


4 Bold Clinton by land. General Clinton, some time before the engagement, landed with a number of troops on Long Island, and it was expected he would have co-operated with Sir Peter Parker, by crossing the narrow passage which divides the two islands; but Colonel Thompson with eight hundred men, stationed to oppose him, induced him to decline the perilous attempt.


5 And the cowardly dogs. The garrison under the command of Colonel Moultrie, although composed entirely of raw troops, showed determination and coolness that would have done honor to the oldest men in the service. They fired deliberately, for the most part took aim, and seldom missed their object. On the day after this gallant action, Moultrie cheered his officers and men in the following spirited and singular language: "My brave companions, you see the advantage of courage and fortitude. You have fought and have conquered, and the gallant fellows who fell in the cannonade of yesterday, are now in Heaven, riding in their chariots like the devil." - New Jersey Journal, 1779.


6 I proceed to New York. A few days after the engagement, the troops re-embarked and the whole sailed for New York.


7 If the cowardly Yankees. During the hottest fire of Sir Peter Parker's squadron, the flag of the fort was shot down. Sergeant William Jasper immediately stood upon the ramparts, with the flag in his hand, until another staff was handed to him, when he planted it and retired.

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its not even midnight on the west coast and i wasn't going to drink, but fuck it. Here is to a great day 231 years ago.

lets not fuck up what they started.

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What kind of glass?

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