The document summarizes the events leading up to and following the United States Declaration of Independence. It describes how Thomas Paine's pamphlet Common Sense changed colonists' views of the British king and argued for citizens, not kings, to make laws. It then discusses the Second Continental Congress in June 1776, where Richard Henry Lee proposed independence and a committee was formed to draft the declaration. On July 2nd, 1776 Congress voted in favor of independence and on July 4th approved the final Declaration of Independence, authored primarily by Thomas Jefferson, which announced the colonies' break from Britain.

1. DECLARING
INDEPENDENCE

2. 1. Loyalists – colonists who sided with Great Britain during the Revolution
2. Patriots - colonists who supported the fight for independence
3. Tyranny – absolute power of a government
4. Mercenaries – foreign soldiers who fought for pay
5. Unalienable – unable to be taken away
6. Traitor – a person who betrays their country (treason= the act of betrayal)
7. Guerrilla warfare – a form of fighting that includes swift surprise attacks on one’s
enemy

3. …Not to be confused with this:

4. • In January of 1776, a pamphlet
called
Common Sense was printed and
distributed in Philadelphia,
then throughout the colonies.
• The author, Thomas Paine,
argued that citizens, not kings,
should make the laws
• Common Sense cried out against
tyranny, and changed the
colonists’
view of the king

5. • In June 1776 another meeting of the Second Continental Congress took place
in Philadelphia.
- At this meeting:
Virginian Richard Henry Lee proposed that the colonies become free and
independent states
A committee was formed to write a document declaring the colonies’
independence from Great Britain
A seal for the new country was created with the motto “E pluribus unum”
– out of many, one. This motto recognized the union of the states.

6. FYI:
Lee’s Resolution –
“…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.”

7. FYI: It took six years,
three committees, and
the contributions of
fourteen men before
the Congress finally
accepted a design in
1782.
The GREAT SEAL OF
THE UNITED STATES

8. • On July 1, the delegates of the 13 colonies debated Lee’s resolution, and on
July 2, 12 of the colonies voted in favor of the proposal. New York abstained
from voting.
• On July 4, 1776, Congress approved the Declaration of Independence
• The main author of the Declaration
was Thomas Jefferson
• The document formally announced the
colonies’ break from Great Britain

9. FYI:
In a letter to his wife Abigail, John Adams said this about the SECOND of July:
"The Second Day of July 1776, will be the most memorable Epocha, in the History of America.
I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated, by succeeding Generations, as the great
anniversary Festival. It ought to be commemorated, as the Day of Deliverance by solemn
Acts of Devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with Pomp and Parade, with
Shews, Games, Sports, Guns, Bells, Bonfires and Illuminations from one End of this Continent
to the other from this Time forward forever more."

10. • The Declaration of Independence expressed three main ideas:
1. All people possess unalienable rights, including rights to life, liberty,
and the pursuit of happiness
2. Britain’s King George III had violated colonists’ rights by taxing them
without consent
3. The colonies had the right to break away from Britain in order to
protect the rights of the American citizens

11. • In approving the Declaration of Independence the American colonies broke all
ties to the British crown and became the United States of America
• The signing of the Declaration was an act of full-scale revolt against Britain
- Supporters were considered traitors, and could be severely punished

12. FYI:
- John Hancock, as the President of the Continental Congress, was the first to sign it
- The Declaration was not signed until August 2, 1776, and all signatures were not on it until
November
- Philadelphia printer John Dunlap was given the task of printing hundreds of copies – called
“broadsides” – of the Declaration, to be distributed across the colonies, and to commanders
of the Continental troops
- On July 8, 1776, Col. John Nixon gave the first public reading of the Declaration, outside of
the Pennsylvania State House (Independence Hall) in Philadelphia. This event is reenacted
every year on that date.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6VmOcAAT9Js