LAD/Blog #3: Declaration of Independence

1. List the democratic principles discussed in the opening.

• all men are created equal
• unalienable rights include life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness
• the government draws its power from the people
• people have the right to change a government that does not support them, in order to maintain their peace, safety, and happiness

2. List 5 grievances the colonists were making the King aware of.  

• the King made decisions based only on his own opinions and the economy of Britain
• the King denied them the benefits of a trial by jury 
• the King wouldn't let them trade with any other country in the world
• the King quartered large numbers of troops in the colonies, without their consent
• the King relentlessly taxed the colonies

3. Summarize what the final paragraph is saying.
In the final paragraph, the colonists are pleading their case for a new nation by saying that they have good intentions and deserve independence.  They strongly believe that they ought to be free and independent states with the right to govern themselves.  In this paragraph, they directly say how they are good and just people who have done nothing wrong except wish for freedom, and how they deserve to be completely split (especially politically) from Great Britain.  The colonists also include how they desire the rights that every other independent nation of that time period had (starting and ending wars, establishing alliances and commerce, etc.).  This paragraph further explains how all of the colonists agree to unite together and live by this declaration. 

The Declaration of Sentiments (1848) was very similar to the Declaration of Independence (1776), and not just because both of the names start the same way.  Both were lists of grievances made against people who they believed had wronged them.  The colonists made their list of grievances about the King, while the women at the convention at Seneca Falls, New York, made their list about men, and how for numerous years they had denied women basic human rights.  Further, the Declaration of Sentiments, written by Elizabeth Cady Stanton, was actually modeled by the Declaration of Independence