On July 4, 1776, fifty-six largely wealthy and prominent men signed a document that changed the course of human history drastically and radically. These men, many of whom were students of the Enlightenment and steeped in natural law philosophy, risked their "Lives, Fortunes, and sacred Honor," for a set of ideas whose time had finally arrived. The Declaration of Independence set in motion the ideas of liberty and unalienable, natural rights, that would soon not only forge a union of independent states in North America, but would set the Western world afire.
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.
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