The Declaration of Independence

IN CONGRESS, JULY 4,
1776 THE UNANIMOUS
DECLARATION OF THE
THIRTEEN UNITED
STATES OF AMERAICA

      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 Nature and 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 they are among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among them, deriving their just power 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 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 shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than t 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 usurpations, all having in direct object tyranny over these States. To prove this, let 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 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 invasion on the rights of the people.
     He has refused for a long time, after such dissolution, 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 meantime exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without and convulsion within.
     He has endeavored to prevent the population of these states; for that purpose obstructing the laws of naturalizing of foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migration hither, and raising the condition of new appropriations of lands.
     He has obstructed the administration of justice, by refusing his assent of laws for establishing judiciary powers.
     He has made judges dependent on his will alone, for the tenure of their office, and the amount and payment of their salary. 
     He has erected a multitude of new officers, and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people, and eat out our substances.
     He has kept among us, in times of peace, standing armies without the consent of our legislatures.
     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 legislation.
     For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us;
     For protecting them, by a mock trial, from punishment for any murder 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 seas to be tried for pretended offenses;  
     For abolishing the free systems of English laws in a neighboring 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 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 power 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 parallel 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 insurrection amongst us, and has endeavored 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 petition 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 attention 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 usurpation, 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 authority of the good people of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United States Colonies and Independent States; that they are absolved by from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State, 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 Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.

    在人類事務發展的過程中，當一個民族必須解除同另一個民族的聯系，并按照自然法則和上帝的旨意，以獨立平等的身份立于世界列國之林時，出于對人類輿論的尊重，必須把驅使他們獨立的原因予以宣布。

　　我們認為下述真理是不言而喻的：人人生而平等，造物主賦予他們若干不可讓與的權利，其中包括生存權、自由權和追求幸福的權利。為了保障這些權利，人們才在他們中間建立政府，而政府的正當權利，則是經被統治者同意授予的。任何形式的政府一旦對這些目標的實現起破壞作用時，人民便有權予以更換或廢除，以建立一個新的政府。新政府所依據的原則和組織其權利的方式，務使人民認為唯有這樣才最有可能使他們獲得安全和幸福。若真要審慎的來說，成立多年的政府是不應當由于無關緊要的和一時的原因而予以更換的。過去的一切經驗都說明，任何苦難，只要尚能忍受，人類還是情愿忍受，也不想為申冤而廢除他們久已習慣了的政府形式。然而，當始終追求同一目標的一系列濫用職權和強取豪奪的行為表明政府企圖把人民至于專制暴政之下時，人民就有權也有義務去推翻這樣的政府，并為其未來的安全提供新的保障。這就是這些殖民地過去忍受苦難的經過，也是他們現在不得不改變政府制度的原因。當今大不列顛王國的歷史，就是屢屢傷害和掠奪這些殖民地的歷史，其直接目標就是要在各州之上建立一個獨裁暴政。為了證明上述句句屬實，現將事實公諸于世，讓公正的世人作出評判。

　　他拒絕批準對公眾利益最有益、最必需的法律。

　　他禁止他的殖民總督批準刻不容緩、極端重要的法律，要不就先行擱置這些法律直至征得他的同意，而這些法律被擱置以后，他又完全置之不理。

　　他拒絕批準便利大地區人民的其他的法律，除非這些地區的人民情愿放棄自己在自己在立法機構中的代表權；而代表權對人民是無比珍貴的，只有暴君才畏懼它。

　　他把各州的立法委員召集到一個異乎尋常、極不舒適而有遠離他們的檔案庫的地方去開會，其目的無非是使他們疲憊不堪，被迫就范。

　　他一再解散各州的眾議院，因為后者堅決反對他侵犯人民的權利。

　　他在解散眾議院之后，又長期拒絕另選他人，于是這項不可剝奪的立法權便歸由普通人民來行使，致使在這其間各州仍處于外敵入侵和內部騷亂的種種危險之中。

　　他力圖阻止各州增加人口，為此目的，他阻撓外國人入籍法的通過，拒絕批準其他鼓勵移民的法律，并提高分配新土地的條件。

　　他拒絕批準建立司法權利的法律，以阻撓司法的執行。

　　他迫使法官為了保住任期、薪金的數額和支付而置于他個人意志的支配之下。

　　他濫設新官署，委派大批官員到這里騷擾我們的人民，吞噬他們的財物。

　　他在和平時期，未經我們立法機構同意，就在我們中間維持其常備軍。

　　他施加影響，使軍隊獨立于文官政權之外，并凌駕于文官政權之上。

　　他同他人勾結，把我們置于一種既不符合我們的法規也未經我們法律承認的管轄之下，而且還批準他們炮制的各種偽法案，以便任其在我們中間駐扎大批武裝部隊；不論這些人對我們各州居民犯下何等嚴重的謀殺罪，他可用加審判來庇護他們，讓他們逍遙法外；他可以切斷我們同世界各地的貿易；未經我們同意便向我們強行征稅；在許多案件中剝奪我們享有陪審制的權益；以莫須有的罪名把我們押送海外受審；他在一個鄰省廢除了英國法律的自由制度，在那里建立專制政府，擴大其疆域，使其立即成為一個樣板和合適的工具，以便向這里各殖民地推行同樣的專制統治；他取消我們的許多特許狀，廢除我們最珍貴的法律并從根本上改變我們各州政府的形式；他終止我們立法機構行使權力，宣稱他們自己擁有在任何情況下為我們制定法律的權力。

　　他們放棄設在這里的政府，宣稱我們已不屬他們保護之列，并向我們發動戰爭。

　　他在我們的海域里大肆掠奪，蹂躪我們的沿海地區，燒毀我們的城鎮，殘害我們人民的生命。

　　他此時正在運送大批外國雇傭兵，來從事其制造死亡、荒涼和暴政的勾當，其殘忍與卑劣從一開始就連最野蠻的時代也難以相比，他已完全不配當一個文明國家的元首。

　　他強迫我們在公海被他們俘虜的同胞拿起武器反對自己的國家，使他們成為殘殺自己親友的劊子手，或使他們死于自己親友的手下。

　　他在我們中間煽動內亂，并竭力挑唆殘酷無情的印地安蠻子來對付我們邊疆的居民，而眾所周知，印地安人作戰的準則是不分男女老幼、是非曲直，格殺勿論。

　　在遭受這些壓迫的每一階段，我們都曾以最謙卑的言辭吁請予以糾正。而我們一次又一次的情愿，卻只是被報以一次又一次的傷害。

　　一個君主，其品格被他的每一個只有暴君才干的出的行為所暴露時，就不配君臨自由的人民。

　　我們并不是沒有想到我們英國的弟兄。他們的立法機關想把無理的管轄權擴展到我們這里來，我們時常把這個企圖通知他們。我們也曾把我們移民來這里和在這里定居的情況告訴他們。我們曾懇求他們天生的正義感和雅量，念在同種同宗的分上，棄絕這些掠奪行為，因為這些掠奪行為難免會使我們之間的關系和來往中斷。可他們對這種正義和同宗的呼聲也同樣充耳不聞。因此，我們不得不宣布脫離他們，以對待世界上其他民族的態度對待他們：同我交戰者，就是敵人；同我和好者，即為朋友。

　　因此我們這些在大陸會議上集會的美利堅合眾國的代表們，以各殖民地善良人民的名義，并經他們授權，向世界最高裁判者申訴，說明我們的嚴重意向，同時鄭重宣布：

　　我們這些聯合起來的殖民地現在是，而且按公理也應該是，獨立自由的國家；我們對英國王室效忠的全部義務，我們與大不列顛王國之間大不列顛一切政治聯系全部斷絕，而且必須斷絕。

　　作為一個獨立自由的國家，我們完全有權宣戰、締和、結盟、通商和采取獨立國家有權采取的一切行動。

　　我們堅定地信賴神明上帝的保佑，同時以我們的生命、財產和神圣的名譽彼此宣誓來支持這一宣言。

　　〔說明〕

　　杰斐遜起草了《獨立宣言》的第一稿，富蘭克林等人又進行了潤色。大陸會議對此稿又進行了長時間的、激烈的辯論，最終作出了重大的修改。特別是在佐治亞和卡羅來納代表們的堅持下，刪去了杰斐遜對英王喬治三世允許在殖民地保持奴隸制和奴隸買賣的有力譴責。這一部分的原文是這樣的：

　　他的人性本身發動了殘酷的戰爭，侵犯了一個從未冒犯過他的遠方民族的最神圣的生存權和自由權；他誘騙他們，并把他們運往另一半球充當奴隸，或使他們慘死在運送途中。

　　托馬斯.杰斐遜(1743-1826)，生于弗吉尼亞的一個富裕家庭。曾就讀于威廉-瑪麗學院。1767年成為律師，1769年當選為弗吉尼亞下院議院。他積極投身于獨立運動之中，并代表弗吉尼亞出席大陸會議。他曾兩次當選弗吉尼亞州長。1800年當選美國總統。

　　杰斐遜在為自己的墓碑而作的墓志銘中這樣寫到：

　　這里埋葬著托馬斯.杰斐遜，美國《獨立宣言》的作者，弗吉尼亞宗教自由法規的制定者和弗吉尼亞大學之父。