The United States’ Declaration of Independence may well be the most cited yet least read or understood document in American history.
Some have suggested over the years that each responsible U.S. citizen should take the occasion of the Nation’s birthday to read that precious document every year, something like pausing at Thanksgiving to give thanks or at New Year’s to ponder what’s past and ahead.
WATCH LENO SHOW JUST HOW IGNORANT AMERICANS ARE OF FOUNDING (N.B. – PAUL REVERE NEVER ‘SAID THE BRITISH WERE COMING’)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkQ6XgXeNuY&feature=player_embeddedObviously, we can’t require that. But The Ticket can facilitate that. So here it is, in its historic entirety. For those who are curious to see how the historic document evolved, the wording refined and trimmed, through several writings, including those funny s’s that look like f’s, they can view side-by-side versions right here.
And for those who’d like a little musical accompaniment, we have a special treat this July 4th. It’s a video version of the anthem performed by one of our favorite singers, a woman with an amazingly crystaline voice who writes her own songs. We met her here as a Ticket follower on Twitter. Her name is Amiena (her music website is here).
The final version of the Declaration is right here with paragraphs edited for length for typographical purposes on this modern webpage.
IN CONGRESS, JULY 4, 1776
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen United States of America:
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 of Nature and of 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 among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.