The Declaration of Independence

Philadelphia, summer 1776. Delegates from the thirteen colonies sit in a stuffy room in the Pennsylvania State House, today called Independence Hall. They have been at war for more than a year. Now they are ready to say out loud what many have only whispered.

They ask a 33-year-old Virginian to draft a statement. The man who wrote the Declaration of Independence^Q78 was Thomas Jefferson. Benjamin Franklin and John Adams helped edit his draft. Congress voted for independence on July 2. The Declaration of Independence was adopted^Q79 on July 4, 1776.

The founding document that said the American colonies were free from Britain^Q9 is the Declaration of Independence. The Declaration of Independence is important^Q8 because it says America is free from British control. The colonists stopped asking the king for fair treatment and announced they would govern themselves. Among the American Revolution's many important events^Q80, none mattered more than the Declaration of Independence, which gave the war its purpose.

The Declaration carries a line that would echo for centuries: that all men are created equal, with rights to "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." The words "Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness^Q11" come from the Declaration of Independence, not the Constitution. Two important ideas from the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution^Q10 are equality and liberty.

In 1776, those ideals were bigger than the reality. Enslaved people, women and Native Americans were not treated as equals. Much of the rest of this story is the struggle to make that promise apply to everyone.

Thomas Jefferson later became the third president, but of the many things Thomas Jefferson is famous for^Q87, he was proudest of being the writer of the Declaration of Independence. He asked for that title to be carved on his gravestone.

Americans have celebrated July 4 ever since. Independence Day^Q125 is the country's birthday, marked with parades, picnics and fireworks. By a remarkable coincidence, Jefferson and John Adams both died on the same day: July 4, 1826, the nation's 50th birthday.