1: On July 2nd, 1776, the Second Continental Congress voted unanimously to declare independence from Britain.
“That these United Colonies are, and of a 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,” so read the motion.
But “there was too much still to be done,” David McCullough writes in his Pulitzer Prize-winning book, John Adams. “Congress had to review and approve the language of the drafted declaration before it could be made official.”
Three weeks prior, Thomas Jefferson had been tasked with working on a draft of the Declaration of Independence.
“At thirty-three Thomas Jefferson was the youngest of the Virginia delegates,” David writes. “If he was conspicuous, it was mainly because of his height. At six feet two-and-a-half inches, he stood taller than all but a few. . . Standing beside John Adams, Jefferson looked like a lanky, freckled youth.”
Thomas rarely spoke during the Congressional debates. “He ‘abhorred dispute,’ David writes, and “shrank from the contentiousness of politics, and instinctively avoided confrontation of any kind.”
Writing later in life to his grandson, Thomas advised: “When I hear another express an opinion which is not mine, I say to myself, he has a right to his opinion, as I to mine. Why should I question it. His error does me no injury, and shall I become a Don Quixote, to bring all men by force of argument to one opinion? . . . Be a listener only, keep within yourself, and endeavor to establish with yourself the habit of silence, especially in politics.”
What Thomas Jefferson was, however, was a skilled writer.
In the words of John Adams, he had earned “the reputation of a masterly pen.” However reserved he was in Congress, he proved “prompt, frank, explicit, and decisive upon committees and in conversation. . . .”
2: Thomas had arrived in Philadelphia from Virginia on May 14, 1776, one day before the Second Continental Congress met. He found lodgings on the outskirts of the city on the southwest corner of Seventh and Market, in what was then “nearly open country,” David writes. The appeal of the house was its ample windows for “circulating air–and unlike most delegates, he would reside alone.”
Which is where the Declaration of Independence was written.
“Alone in his upstairs parlor at Seventh and Market, Jefferson went to work,” David writes. “He worked rapidly and, to judge by surviving drafts, with a sure command of his material. He had none of his books with him, nor needed any, he later claimed. It was not his objective to be original, he would explain.”
In short: “It was intended to be an expression of the American mind,” David notes, “and to give to that expression the proper tone and spirit called for by the occasion.
“What made Jefferson’s work surpassing was the grace and eloquence of expression,” David comments. “Jefferson had done superbly and in minimum time.”
Which isn’t to say there weren’t revisions.
July 3rd, the day after the vote, was a particularly “painful ordeal” for Thomas, David writes, as “change after change was called for and approximately a quarter of what he had written was cut entirely.
“Seated beside Benjamin Franklin, the young Virginian looked on in silence. He is not known to have uttered a word in protest, or in defense of what he had written,” David writes.
“At one point Franklin leaned over to tell him a story that, as a printer and publisher over so many years, he must have offered before as comfort to a wounded author. He had once known a hatter who wished to have a sign made saying, JOHN THOMPSON, HATTER, MAKES AND SELLS HATS FOR READY MONEY, this to be accompanied by a picture of a hat. But the man had chosen first to ask the opinion of friends, with the result that one word after another was removed as superfluous or redundant, until at last the sign was reduced to Thompson’s name and picture of that hat.”
More than eighty changes were made to Jefferson’s draft.
“Most were minor and served to improve it,” David writes. “The King’s conduct was called one of ‘repeated’ rather than ‘unremitting’ injuries. The accusation that the King had ‘suffered the administration of justice totally to cease in some of these states’ was edited to a simpler “He has obstructed the administration of justice.
“Finally, to Jefferson’s concluding line was added the phrase ‘with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence.’”
3: Yet, ultimately, “it was to be the eloquent lines of the second paragraph of the Declaration that would stand down the years,” David writes, “affecting the human spirit as neither Jefferson nor anyone could have foreseen:
“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. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”
More tomorrow.
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Reflection and Action: For those of us living in the United States, take time this week to give thanks for the many great Americans who preceded us.
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