![]() ![]() Independence needed to be declared, and a new government had to be established. Governments from Massachusetts to Georgia were in pieces and revolt was spreading. Five of the thirteen had lacked agents in London since 1774. It was all very well for Lee to state this, and for Congress to finally agree, but it was something entirely different for representatives from separate Colonies to agree on what terms and in what manner they should absolve allegiance to the Crown. Lee's resolution famously stated "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." Jefferson was tasked to write the Declaration after the resolution of his fellow Virginia representative Richard Henry Lee was set forth in Congress on June 7, 1776. On May 15, it was declared “the exercise of every kind of authority under the Crown should be totally suppressed." Congress was turning into a revolutionary body filled with advisors intent on achieving independence. Therefore, Jefferson likely concieved the Declaration as necessary step along this intellectual continuum to establish a new republican government on behalf of the people.Īs of May 10, 1776, Congress had resolved to establish new governments for the Colonies. Montesquieu’s influential ' Spirit of Laws' designated monarchy to be a government in which executive power was vested in a single person. It is highly probable that Jefferson was thinking of the Declaration in the spring of 1776 when he drafted the Virginia Constitution, which echoed a similar repudiation of allegiance to George III. The Declaration is rooted in Enlightenment philosophy, the English constitution and its charter the ‘ Magna Carta,’ and early modern republicanism. The origins of the Declaration of Independence are found in the history of political thought and the breakdown of Colonial governments after 1770. Danforth.” Emmet’s collection was an incredible resource for American history and included over 10,000 manuscripts, prints, and portraits in addition to Jefferson's draft. I was one minute too late to purchase it directly from Mr. Lee who lived in Alexandria, VA, who has died within a year or two. Emmet had advised Library officials that, “The draft of the Declaration of Independence in Jefferson’s handwriting came from the grandson of Mr. In a letter written around the time his collection was transferred to the Lenox Library, Dr. Historians believe the copy to be one of two made by Jefferson for Richard Henry Lee and George Wythe. Jefferson’s draft arrived at the Library in 1897 as part of the collection of Dr. ![]()
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