Independence (62 page)

Jefferson’s residence in Philadelphia when he wrote the Declaration of Independence. Owned by Jacob Graff, and situated at Seventh and Market, Jefferson lodged here between May and August 1776. He drafted the Declaration of Independence in his two-room parlor on the second story. (Drawing from John T. Scharf and Thompson Westcott’s
History of Philadelphia,
1884.)

Jefferson likely began writing the draft of the Declaration on Wednesday or Thursday, June 12 or 13. Accustomed to rising early, he probably worked in the relative coolness of early morning. He may also have taken up his pen again in the evening, when the traffic beneath his windows faded and an occasional night breeze stirred. It is conceivable too that he skipped some sessions of Congress and worked through the day. Lee, with Wythe in tow, had left for home, but four other members of Virginia’s delegation were present, affording Jefferson the luxury of staying away if he chose to do so.

Only two things are known for certain about Jefferson’s work on the draft: He wrote it while seated in a revolving Windsor chair with a small, folding writing desk placed across his lap, both of which had been custom-made for him by a Philadelphia cabinetmaker.
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And he delivered the draft quickly. Adams later recalled that only “a day or two” was required for Jefferson to complete the task.
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While Adams may not have meant for his comment to be taken literally, Jefferson was ordinarily a rapid writer.

On a “Friday morn” Jefferson sent a copy of the draft to Franklin—he addressed it to “Doctr. Franklyn”—and asked that he “suggest such alterations as his more enlarged view of the subject will dictate.” By then, Jefferson had already shown Adams what he had written.
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Thus, in all probability Jefferson completed his draft within three to five days and gave it to Adams sometime between Monday, June 17, and Wednesday, June 19. Jefferson probably transmitted the draft document to Franklin on Friday, June 21.

Years later Adams, consumed with jealousy at the laurels Jefferson had reaped as the author of the Declaration of Independence, carped that the document was “a juvenile declamation” that merely rehashed what others had said. There was “not an idea in it, but what had been hackneyed in Congress for two years before.” But Adams had forgotten that neither he nor his colleagues on the committee or in Congress wanted Jefferson to write something novel. It would have been ludicrous to have done so. Jefferson correctly understood, as he put it years later, that his task was to avoid “aiming at originality of principle or sentiment.” He was to prepare a draft that captured the “tone and spirit” of “the American mind” toward the mother country’s imperial policies and the king’s decision to make war on them. Along these same lines the document had to make clear why Congress, which had repeatedly insisted that it was not bent on independence, was indeed declaring independence. Within these parameters, Jefferson subsequently said, he merely sought to avoid copying “from any particular and previous writing.”
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As the draft sprang from Jefferson’s pen, it became clear that the Declaration of Independence was to be more than simply a justification of revolution. It need not have been. The English Declaration of Rights, with which Jefferson and every educated colonist was familiar, began with “Whereas” and proceeded to list the charges against the king, James II. When Adams, a month earlier, had written the resolution directing the colonies to abandon their charters and create new, independent governments, he had begun: “Whereas his Britannic Majesty, in conjunction with the Lords and Commons of Great-Britain, has …,” followed by a compilation of the wrongdoings by Britain’s leaders during the past decade. That Jefferson’s draft did not follow those models may have been his unique contribution to the eventual Declaration of Independence. Or, it may have been the result of the instructions provided by the Committee of Five. For instance, in his private correspondence near the time the committee first met, Adams had fervently declared that an independent America must embrace “a more equal Liberty, than has prevail’d in other Parts of the Earth” and must repudiate hereditary rule by the “Dons, the Bashaws, the Grandees, the Patricians, the Sachems, the Nabobs, call them by what Name you please,” but in short, the “insolent Domination, in a few, a very few opulent, monopolizing Families.”
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He and others on the committee may have instructed Jefferson to go beyond merely amassing charges of British despotism and to delineate the meaning of the American Revolution.

Jefferson’s draft included two segments that consciously sought to do more than merely justify the break with Great Britain. Jefferson penned a draft that enunciated in the broadest terms the principles upon which the new nation would stand and around which its citizenry could rally. After all, until recently, the colonists had considered themselves to be British, but those feelings had evaporated. Furthermore, the colonists identified first and foremost with their province and hardly, if at all, with the Continental Congress or the concept of an American Union. But the “united colonies” were about to become the “United States.” Jefferson’s draft, therefore, was meant not only to bring to a close America’s days as colonies of another nation, but to also announce the creation of the American nation.

This was also meant to be a war document. The meaning it gave to the American Revolution should foster a willingness to fight for the new nation and the resplendent ideals for which it stood, while at the same time sustain morale on the home front throughout a lengthy war. However, this document was not to be directed solely at the American citizenry. Its audience included “mankind” in a “candid world,” and none more so than America’s friends in Great Britain who might someday play a useful role in the termination of hostilities and recognition of the United States. The draft referred to “our British brethren” who had long been remarkable for their “native justice & magnanimity,” and especially those among them who had been “our common kindred” in opposing the measures of Lord North’s ministry. As declaring independence at this juncture was due in large measure to the need for foreign assistance, the document was of course directed toward those nations in Europe that might trade or ally with America. (The minute that the Declaration was adopted and printed, the Committee of Secret Correspondence sent a copy to Silas Deane in Paris with instructions that he not only see to its publication in French newspapers but also “communicate the piece to the Court of France, and send copies of it to the other Courts of Europe.” Congress additionally ordered that the Declaration “be proclaimed … at the head of the army.”)
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Very little in Jefferson’s draft was changed before the document was submitted to Congress. Adams appears to have made two alterations and Franklin five, all dealing with phraseology. For example, “his present majesty” was changed to “the present king of Great Britain.” Jefferson subsequently remarked that no changes were made by the Committee of Five, but it seems unlikely that Sherman and Livingston would not have suggested at least one or two alterations. Altogether, sixteen slight modifications were made to the original draft during the roughly ten days between Jefferson’s completion of his task and the document’s presentation to Congress.
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Some of the changes may have been made by Jefferson himself. Like any good author who is never satisfied with what he has written, Jefferson may have been unable to resist the temptation to tinker with his handiwork. Or, he may have been responding to oral suggestions that were made at the one or more committee meetings that were held, and some of these recommendations may have been made by Livingston or Sherman. But what is abundantly clear is that the document submitted to Congress was almost exclusively the work of Jefferson.

Jefferson had drawn on several sources, including the English Whig polemicists he had read in his youth. He was familiar with the sentiments of his fellow congressmen, even having taken copious notes on what they said in the debates on independence on June 8 and 10. He was familiar with the Declaration of Rights enacted by the First Congress, a statement that both enumerated the rights enjoyed by all freeborn Englishmen and laid out America’s prewar complaints. Since the commencement of hostilities, Congress had adopted two statements that explained in detail the colonists’ grievances. Jefferson had been one of the authors of the Declaration on the Causes and Necessity of Taking Up Arms, and he was intimately familiar with Adams’s May 10 resolution on jettisoning charter governments.
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Jefferson was additionally conversant with some of the pamphlet literature produced by American protestors since the Stamp Act, and he was acquainted with at least some of the declarations on independence promulgated since March by several provincial congresses and local committees of safety.

However, nothing influenced Jefferson more than the draft of Virginia’s Declaration of Rights. It had been submitted to the Virginia Convention in May and was published in a Philadelphia newspaper on the day after the Committee of Five was created. The language of a portion of the Virginia document foreshadowed what Jefferson wrote. It stated, among other things, that “all men are born equally free and independent, and have certain inherent natural rights … among which are the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety.” It additionally stated that “all power is vested in, and … derived from the people,” and that the purpose of government was to secure the people’s “greatest degree of happiness and safety.” But if the government “shall be found inadequate or contrary to these purposes … a majority of the community hath an indubitable, unalienable and indefeasible right to reform, alter, or abolish it.”
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Jefferson’s draft included four sections. The preface consisted of a seldom-remembered though important introductory paragraph. It hinted that America’s dependent status had been temporary. The time had arrived “to dissolve the political bands” that had tied the colonists to Great Britain and “to assume among the powers of the earth the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and nature’s god entitle them.”
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Beginning with a melodic encapsulation of the natural rights of humankind, Jefferson proceeded with a lyrical but forceful affirmation of the right of revolution:

We hold these truths to be self-evident; that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with inherent and inalienable 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 the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying it’s foundation on such principles, and organising it’s 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 & 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, begun at a distinguished period, & 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, & to provide new guards for their future security.

Jefferson was clearly using the draft of Virginia’s Declaration of Rights as a template, though he improved it stylistically. With one exception, he adhered to it faithfully. Virginia’s statement enumerated the natural rights of humankind as including life, liberty, and property. Jefferson did not mention property. It has been conjectured that Jefferson may have sought to simplify the long and cumbersome phraseology of his Virginia friends.
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But as this was a war document, Jefferson must have understood that in a protracted conflict—which by June 1776 looked increasingly likely—the military service of nonproperty owners would be an unavoidable necessity. Jefferson probably deliberately sought to say that this was a revolution in which all free Americans, not just those who owned property, had a stake.
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