Happy Independence Day!

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.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, 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; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

Georgia

Button Gwinnett

Lyman Hall

George Walton



North Carolina

William Hooper

Joseph Hewes

John Penn



South Carolina

Edward Rutledge

Thomas Heyward, Jr.

Thomas Lynch, Jr.

Arthur Middleton



Massachusetts

John Hancock

Maryland

Samuel Chase

William Paca

Thomas Stone

Charles Carroll of Carrollton



Virginia

George Wythe

Richard Henry Lee

Thomas Jefferson

Benjamin Harrison

Thomas Nelson, Jr.

Francis Lightfoot Lee

Carter Braxton



Pennsylvania

Robert Morris

Benjamin Rush

Benjamin Franklin

John Morton

George Clymer

James Smith

George Taylor

James Wilson

George Ross

Delaware

Caesar Rodney

George Read

Thomas McKean



New York

William Floyd

Philip Livingston

Francis Lewis

Lewis Morris



New Jersey

Richard Stockton

John Witherspoon

Francis Hopkinson

John Hart

Abraham Clark



New Hampshire

Josiah Bartlett

William Whipple



Massachusetts

Samuel Adams

John Adams

Robert Treat Paine

Elbridge Gerry



Rhode Island

Stephen Hopkins

William Ellery



Connecticut

Roger Sherman

Samuel Huntington

William Williams

Oliver Wolcott



New Hampshire

Matthew Thornton

Have you ever wondered what happened to the 56 men who signed the Declaration of Independence?

Five signers were captured by the British as traitors, and tortured before they died. Twelve had their homes ransacked and burned. Two lost their sons in the revolutionary army, another had two sons captured. Nine of the 56 fought and died from wounds or hardships of the revolutionary war.

They signed and they pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor.

Thanks g95, and m94 for posting. I'd like to know who those (14 - 28 ?) men were, some who may have "double sacrificed". I also wonder how many have been "canceled" by having their names redacted from various schools, streets, etc. by a bunch of ingrates.

@gammanu95

I will play along and comment on your discussion:

“Men will continue to commit atrocities,” Voltaire wrote, “as long as they continue to believe absurdities.”

I am sure you are aware that the so-called founding fathers were British paranoid hypocrites and ungrateful malcontents men that shifted authority and lawmaking, from the king to private potentates and their own elected/selected “accountable” democratic officials (puppets)

And the part regarding the Native Americans is just inconsistent with the UNDENIABLE reality of the genocide committed against the natives

“He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.”

The British/Americans are the known merciless whose known rule of war/invasion/conquest is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions all over the world to this day.

THE UNDENIABLE REALITY

^^
all you do is post endlessly about past atrocities but never suggest a path forward.

If you’re not part of the solution you’re part of the problem.

And if the US is so bad, there are about 194 other countries to choose from. Or is it perhaps the US is still one of the better options?

@motorhead, it seems you are replying to one of the anti-American pissants that I have muted, but I think Winston Churchill hit the nail on the head: "Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others."

“You’re not supposed to be so blind with narcissism, patriotism and racism that you can’t face reality.

Wrong is wrong, no matter what, when where or who does it or who says it.

My country, right or wrong;

if right, to be kept right;

and if wrong, to be set right.”

America’s birth was the birth of a new empire, like mother (Britain) like daughter (USA)

Your statement, in a variety of forms;

“If you don’t like America, then leave!”

Has been passed down to generation after generation of egotistical, racist hate groups considered right-wing extremist and terrorist.

To suggest that an American hates America just because as a citizen criticizes all the terrible genocides and crimes that America’s industrial war complex has committed, and does continue to commit, since the beginning of its existence is nonsense.

The bigger problem are people who think that America is untouchable and that it should not be criticized.

The signers of the declaration put their very necks on the line and have been rewarded with notoriety. Being hung by their necks until dead was the very real reality they were facing if caught. However there are some others who risked the very same outcome, if captured, but received little reward and notoriety. For one: here’s to Abraham Woodhull and the others who made up the the Culper spy ring. A case can be made that without the clandestine operations of the Culper spy ring, George Washington and the continental army are defeated by the British. An outcome that would have caused a very different history.

Club ad of the week!

^ Yeah, I'm a shill for good, old-fashioned, flag-waving, stand-for-the-anthem, American patriotism.

“America sucks and needs to be dismantled.”

~ Papi_Chulo, TUSCL, August 14, 2020
~ White (Cuban) guy residing in Miami, FL

^ Sad but so true Papi.

~ Warrior15, TUSCL, August 14, 2020
~ Just a Monger looking for some Action.

I'm a shill for Truth, Justice, and the American way.

I'm for truth, no matter who tells it.

I'm for justice, no matter who it is for or against.

I'm a human being first and foremost, and as such…

l'm for whoever and whatever benefits humanity as a whole.

~ Malcolm Little
~ Born May 19, 1925 Omaha, Nebraska, U.S.
~ Died February 21, 1965 New York City, U.S.

OP is is a Putin fanboy just like his idol Trump.

^LOL, demented old twat thinks he can troll me

Nobody's interested in trolling a moron like you just showing you that sauce for the goose works on the bigoted moron.
Manager of a busy medical practice sure has a lot of time on his hands.
Dopey motherfucker sad sack.

^LOL, demented old twat thinks he can troll me