1. No state shall enter into any treaty, alliance, or confederation;
grant letters of marque and reprisal; coin money; emit bills of credit;
make any thing but gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts;
pass any bill of attainder, ex-post-facto law, or law impairing the
obligation of contracts; or grant any title of nobility.
2. No state shall, without the consent of Congress, lay any imposts or
duties on imports or exports, except what may be absolutely necessary
for executing its inspection laws; and the nett produce of all duties
and imposts laid by any state on imports or exports shall be for the
use of the treasury of the United States, and all such laws shall
be subject to the revision and control of Congress. No state shall,
without the consent of Congress, lay any duty on tonnage, keep troops
or ships of war in time of peace, enter into any agreement or compact
with another state, or with a foreign power, or engage in war, unless
actually invaded, or in such imminent danger as will not admit of delay.
ARTICLE II.
_Of the Executive._
SECTION I.
1. The executive power shall be vested in a President of the United
States of America. He shall hold his office during the term of four
years, and, together with the Vice President, chosen for the same term,
be elected as follows:—
2. Each state shall appoint, in such manner as the legislature thereof
may direct, a number of electors, equal to the whole number of senators
and representatives to which the state may be entitled in Congress; but
no senator or representative, or person holding any office of trust or
profit under the United States, shall be appointed an elector.
3. The electors shall meet in their respective states, and vote by
ballot for two persons, of whom one at least shall not be an inhabitant
of the same state with themselves. And they shall make a list of all
the persons voted for, and of the number of votes for each; which
list they shall sign and certify, and transmit sealed to the seat of
the government of the United States, directed to the President of the
Senate. The President of the Senate shall, in the presence of the
Senate and House of Representatives, open all the certificates, and
the votes shall then be counted. The person having the greatest number
of votes shall be the President, if such number be a majority of the
whole number of electors appointed; and if there be more than one who
have such majority, and have an equal number of votes, then the House
of Representatives shall immediately choose by ballot one of them for
President; and if no person have a majority, then, from the five
highest on the list, the said House shall in like manner choose the
President. But in choosing the President, the votes shall be taken by
states, the representation from each state having one vote; a quorum
for this purpose shall consist of a member or members from two-thirds
of the states, and a majority of all the states shall be necessary to
a choice. In every case after the choice of the President, the person
having the greatest number of votes of the electors shall be Vice
President. But if there should remain two or more who have equal votes,
the Senate shall choose from them by ballot the Vice President.
4. The Congress may determine the time of choosing the electors and the
day on which they shall give their votes, which day shall be the same
throughout the United States.
5. No person except a natural-born citizen, or a citizen of the
United States at the time of the adoption of this constitution, shall
be eligible to the office of President; neither shall any person be
eligible to that office who shall not have attained to the age of
thirty-five years, and been fourteen years a resident within the United
States.
6. In case of the removal of the President from office, or of his
death, resignation, or inability to discharge the powers and duties
of the said office, the same shall devolve on the Vice President;
and the Congress may by law provide for the case of removal, death,
resignation, or inability, both of the President and Vice President,
declaring what officer shall then act as President; and such officer
shall act accordingly, until the disability be removed or a President
shall be elected.
7. The President shall, at stated times, receive for his services a
compensation, which shall neither be increased nor diminished during
the period for which he shall have been elected, and he shall not
receive within that period any other emolument from the United States,
or any of them.
8. Before he enter on the execution of his office, he shall take the
following oath or affirmation:—
“I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the
office of President of the United States, and will, to the best of my
ability, preserve, protect, and defend the constitution of the United
States.”
SECTION II.
1. The President shall be commander-in-chief of the army and navy
of the United States and of the militia of the several states, when
called into the actual service of the United States; he may require
the opinion in writing of the principal officer in each of the
executive departments, upon any subject relating to the duties of
their respective offices; and he shall have power to grant reprieves
and pardons for offences against the United States, except in cases of
impeachment.
2. He shall have power, by and with the advice and consent of the
Senate, to make treaties, provided two-thirds of the senators present,
concur: and he shall nominate, and by and with the advice and consent
of the Senate, shall appoint ambassadors, other public ministers and
consuls, judges of the supreme court, and all other officers of the
United States, whose appointments are not herein otherwise provided
for, and which shall be established by law. But the Congress may by law
vest the appointment of such inferior officers as they think proper
in the President alone, in the courts of law, or in the heads of
departments.
3. The President shall have power to fill up all vacancies that may
happen during the recess of the Senate, by granting commissions, which
shall expire at the end of the next session.
SECTION III.
1. He shall, from time to time, give to Congress information of the
state of the Union, and recommend to their consideration such measures
as he shall judge necessary and expedient; he may, on extraordinary
occasions, convene both Houses, or either of them; and in case of
disagreement between them, with respect to the time of adjournment,
he may adjourn them to such time as he shall think proper; he shall
receive ambassadors and other public ministers; he shall take care that
the laws be faithfully executed; and shall commission all the officers
of the United States.
SECTION IV.
1. The President, Vice President, and all civil officers of the United
States, shall be removed from office on impeachment for and conviction
of treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.
ARTICLE III.
_Of the Judiciary._
SECTION I.
1. The judicial power of the United States shall be vested in one
Supreme Court, and in such inferior courts as Congress may, from time
to time order and establish. The judges, both of the supreme and
inferior courts, shall hold their offices during good behaviour; and
shall, at stated times, receive for their services a compensation,
which shall not be diminished during their continuance in office.
SECTION II.
1. The judicial power shall extend to all cases in law and equity
arising under this Constitution, the laws of the United States, and
treaties made, or which shall be made, under their authority; to all
cases affecting ambassadors, other public ministers, and consuls; to
all cases of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction; to controversies to
which the United States shall be a party; to controversies between two
or more states; between a state and citizens of another state; between
citizens of different states; between citizens of the same state
claiming lands under grants of different states; and between a state,
or the citizens thereof and foreign states, citizens, or subjects.
2. In all cases affecting ambassadors, other public ministers, and
consuls, and those in which a state shall be a party, the Supreme
Court shall have original jurisdiction. In all the other cases before
mentioned the Supreme Court shall have appellate jurisdiction, both as
to law and fact, with such exceptions, and under such regulations as
Congress shall make.
3. The trial of all crimes, except in cases of impeachment, shall be by
jury, and such trial shall be held in the state where the said crimes
shall have been committed; but when not committed within any state,
the trial shall be at such place or places as Congress may by law have
directed.
SECTION III.
1. Treason against the United States shall consist only in levying
war against them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving them aid
and comfort. No person shall be convicted of treason, unless on the
testimony of two witnesses to the same overt act, or confession in open
court.
2. Congress shall have power to declare the punishment of treason; but
no attainder of treason shall work corruption of blood, or forfeiture,
except during the life of the person attainted.
ARTICLE IV.
_Miscellaneous._
SECTION I.
1. Full faith and credit shall be given in each state to the public
acts, records, and judicial proceedings of every other state. And
Congress may, by general laws, prescribe the manner in which such acts,
records, and proceedings shall be proved, and the effect thereof.
SECTION II.
1. The citizens of each state shall be entitled to all the privileges
and immunities of citizens in the several states.
2. A person charged in any state with treason, felony, or other crime,
who shall flee from justice and be found in another state, shall, on
demand of the executive authority of the state from which he fled, be
delivered up, to be removed to the state having jurisdiction of the
crime.
3. No person held to service or labour in one state, under the laws
thereof, escaping into another shall, in consequence of any law or
regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labour; but
shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or
labour may be due.
SECTION III.
1. New states may be admitted by Congress into this union; but no new
state shall be formed or erected within the jurisdiction of any other
state, nor any state be formed by the junction of two or more states,
or parts of states, without the consent of the legislatures of the
states concerned, as well as of Congress.
2. Congress shall have power to dispose of, and make all needful rules
and regulations respecting the territory, or other property belonging
to the United States; and nothing in this constitution shall be so
construed as to prejudice any claims of the United States or of any
particular state.
SECTION IV.
1. The United States shall guarantee to every state in this union a
republican form of government, and shall protect each of them against
invasion; and, on application of the legislature, or of the executive
(when the legislature cannot be convened), against domestic violence.
ARTICLE V.
_Of Amendments._
1. Congress, whenever two-thirds of both houses shall deem it
necessary, shall propose amendments to this constitution; or, on the
application of the legislatures of two-thirds of the several states,
shall call a convention for proposing amendments, which, in either
case, shall be valid to all intents and purposes, as part of this
constitution, when ratified by the legislatures of three-fourths of
the several states, or by conventions in three-fourths thereof, as the
one or the other mode of ratification may be proposed by Congress;
provided, that no amendment which may be made prior to the year one
thousand eight hundred and eight, shall in any manner affect the first
and fourth clauses in the ninth section of the first article; and that
no state, without its consent, shall be deprived of its equal suffrage
in the senate.
ARTICLE VI.
_Miscellaneous._
1. All debts contracted, and engagements entered into, before the
adoption of this constitution, shall be as valid against the United
States under this constitution, as under the confederation.
2. This constitution, and the laws of the United States which shall be
made in pursuance thereof, and all treaties made, or which shall be
made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme
law of the land; and the judges in every state shall be bound thereby,
any thing in the constitution or laws of any state to the contrary
notwithstanding.
3. The senators and representatives before mentioned, and the members
of the several state legislatures, and all executive and judicial
officers, both of the United States and of the several states, shall
be bound by oath or affirmation to support this constitution: but no
religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office,
or public trust, under the United States.
ARTICLE VII.
_Of the Ratification._
1. The ratification of the conventions of nine states shall be
sufficient for the establishment of this constitution between the
states so ratifying the same.
Done in Convention, by the unanimous consent of the states present,
the seventeenth day of September, in the year of our Lord one
thousand seven hundred and eighty-seven, and of the independence
of the United States of America the twelfth. In witness whereof,
we have hereunto subscribed our names.
GEORGE WASHINGTON,
_President, and Deputy from Virginia_.
NEW HAMPSHIRE.
John Langdon,
Nicholas Gilman.
MASSACHUSETTS.
Nathaniel Gorman,
Rufus King.
NEW JERSEY.
William Livingston,
David Brearly,
William Patterson,
Jonathan Dayton.
PENNSYLVANIA.
Benjamin Franklin,
Thomas Mifflin,
Robert Morris,
George Clymer,
Thomas Fitzsimmons,
Jared Ingersoll,
James Wilson,
Governeur Morris.
DELAWARE.
George Read,
Gunning Bedford, jun.
John Dickinson,
Richard Bassett,
Jacob Broom.
CONNECTICUT.
William Samuel Johnson,
Roger Sherman.
NEW YORK.
Alexander Hamilton.
MARYLAND.
James M’Henry,
Daniel of St. Tho. Jenifer,
Daniel Carroll.
VIRGINIA.
John Blair,
James Madison, jun.
NORTH CAROLINA.
William Blount,
Richard Dobbs Spaight,
Hugh Williamson.
SOUTH CAROLINA.
John Rutledge,
Chas. Cotesworth Pinckney,
Charles Pinckney,
Pierce Butler.
GEORGIA.
William Few,
Abraham Baldwin.
_Attest_, WILLIAM JACKSON, _Secretary_.
AMENDMENTS TO THE CONSTITUTION.
Art. 1. Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of
religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the
freedom of speech or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably
to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
Art. 2. A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a
free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be
infringed.
Art. 3. No soldier shall, in time of peace, be quartered in any house
without the consent of the owner; nor in time of war, but in a manner
to be prescribed by law.
Art. 4. The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses,
papers and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall
not be violated; and no warrants shall issue but upon probable cause,
supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place
to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
Art. 5. No person shall be held to answer for a capital or otherwise
infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury,
except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia
when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any
person be subject for the same offence to be put twice in jeopardy
of life or limb; nor shall be compelled, in any criminal case, to be
witness against himself; nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property,
without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for
public use without just compensation.
Art. 6. In all criminal prosecutions the accused shall enjoy the right
to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the state and
district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district
shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed
of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with
the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining
witnesses in his favour; and to have the assistance of counsel for his
defence.
Art. 7. In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall
exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved;
and no fact tried by jury shall be otherwise re-examined in any court
of the United States than according to the rules of the common law.
Art. 8. Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines
imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.
Art. 9. The enumeration in the constitution of certain rights, shall
not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
Art. 10. The powers not delegated to the United States by the
constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the
states respectively or to the people.
Art. 11. The judicial power of the United States shall not be construed
to extend to any suit in law or equity commenced or prosecuted against
one of the United States by citizens of another state, or by citizens
or subjects of another state, or by citizens or subjects of any foreign
state.
Art. 12. § 1. The electors shall meet in their respective states,
and vote by ballot for president and vice-president, one of whom, at
least, shall not be an inhabitant of the same state with themselves;
they shall name in their ballots the person voted for as president,
and in distinct ballots the person voted for as vice-president; and
they shall make distinct lists of all persons voted for as president
and of all persons voted for as vice-president, and of the number of
votes for each, which list they shall sign and certify, and transmit
sealed to the seat of the government of the United States, directed
to the president of the senate; the president of the senate shall, in
the presence of the senate and house of representatives, open all the
certificates, and the votes shall then be counted; the person having
the greatest number of votes for president shall be the president, if
such number be a majority of the whole number of electors appointed;
and if no person have such a majority, then from the persons having the
highest numbers, not exceeding three, on the list of those voted for
as president, the house of representatives shall choose immediately by
ballot the president. But in choosing the president, the votes shall
be taken by states, the representation from each state having one
vote; a quorum for this purpose shall consist of a member or members
from two-thirds of the states, and a majority of all the states shall
be necessary to a choice. And if the house of representatives shall
not choose a president whenever the right of choice shall devolve
upon them, before the fourth day of March next following, then the
vice-president shall act as president, as in the case of the death or
other constitutional disability of the president.
2. The person having the greatest number of votes as vice-president
shall be the vice-president, if such number be a majority of the whole
number of electors appointed; and if no person have a majority, then
from the two highest numbers on the list the senate shall choose the
vice-president: a quorum for the purpose shall consist of two-thirds of
the whole number of senators, and a majority of the whole number shall
be necessary to a choice.
3. But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of president
shall be eligible to that of vice-president of the United States.
_The following is the original copy of the Declaration of
Independence as written by Thomas Jefferson. The part printed
with quotations was erased by Congress and the words in brackets
supplied._
A DECLARATION BY THE REPRESENTATIVES OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA IN
GENERAL CONGRESS ASSEMBLED.
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] “inherent
and” unalienable rights; that amongst 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 a 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 shown, 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,
“begun at a distinguished period and” 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 to their future security. Such has been the patient
sufferance of these colonies; and such is now the necessity which
constrains them to [alter] “expunge” their former systems of government.
The history of the present king of Great Britain is a history of
[repeated] “unremitting” injuries and usurpations, “among which appears
no solitary fact to contradict the uniform tenor of the rest; but all
have” [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, “for the truth of which we pledge a faith yet unsullied
by falsehood.”
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 “and continually,”
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 danger 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 “suffered” [obstructed] the administration of justice “totally
to cease in some of these states,” [by] refusing his assent to laws for
establishing judiciary powers.
He has made “our” 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, “by a self-assumed power,”
and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people and eat out
their substance.
He has kept among us in times of peace standing armies, “and ships of
war,” 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 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 “states”
[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 whatever:
He has abdicated government here “withdrawing his governors, and”
[by] declaring us out of his [allegiance] 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
complete the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun
with circumstances of cruelty and perfidy, [scarcely paralleled in the
most barbarous ages, and] totally unworthy the head of a civilized
nation.
The three next paragraphs in the original draught, were as follows:
“He 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 of
existence.
“He has incited treasonable insurrections of our fellow-citizens, with
the allurements of forfeiture and confiscation of our property.
“He has constrained others, taken captives 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.”
In place of the three paragraphs erased, the two following were
introduced:
[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.]
The next paragraph, which related to the slave trade, was entirely
erased. It was as follows:
“He has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating its most
sacred rights of life and liberty in the persons of a distant people,
who never offended him, captivating and carrying them into slavery, in
another hemisphere, or to incur miserable death in their transportation
thither. This piratical warfare, the opprobrium of infidel powers, is
the warfare of a Christian king of Great Britain. Determined to keep
open a market where =MEN= should be bought and sold, he has prostituted
his negative for suppressing every legislative attempt to prohibit or
restrain this execrable commerce; and that this assemblage of horrors
might want no fact of distinguished dye, he is now exciting those
very people to rise in arms among us, and to purchase that liberty of
which he has deprived them, by murdering the people upon whom he also
obtruded them; thus paying off former crimes committed against the
liberties of one people, with crimes which he urges them to commit
against the lives of another.”
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 “who mean to be free. Future ages will scarce believe that the
hardiness of one man adventured within the short compass of twelve
years only, to build a foundation so broad and undisguised, for tyranny
over a people fostered and fixed in principles of freedom.”
Nor have we been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We
have warned them from time to time, of attempts by their legislature
“to extend a jurisdiction over these our states,” [to extend an
unwarrantable jurisdiction over us.] We have reminded them of the
circumstances of our emigration and settlement here, “no one of which
could warrant so strange a pretension: that these were effected at
the expense of our own blood and treasure, unassisted by the wealth
or the strength of Great Britain: that in constituting indeed our
several forms of government, we had adopted one common king, thereby
laying a foundation for perpetual league and amity with them: but that
submission to their parliament was no part of our constitution, nor
ever in idea, if history may be credited; and” we [have] appealed to
their native justice and magnanimity, “as well as to” [and we have
assured them by] the ties of our common kindred, to disavow these
usurpations, which “were likely to” [would inevitably] interrupt our
connexions and correspondence. They too, have been deaf to the voice
of justice and of consanguinity; “and when occasions have been given
them by the regular course of their laws, of removing from their
councils, the disturbers of our harmony, they have by their free
election re-established them in power. At this very time too, they
are permitting their chief magistrate to send over not only soldiers
of our common blood, but [Scotch and] foreign mercenaries to invade
and destroy us. These facts have given the last stab to agonizing
affection; and manly spirit bids us to renounce forever these unfeeling
brethren. We must endeavour to forget our former love for them, and
to hold them as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies in war, in peace
friends. We might have been a free and a great people together; but
a communication of grandeur and of freedom it seems, is below their
dignity. Be it so, since they will have it. The road to happiness and
to glory is open to us too: we will climb it apart from them, and
acquiesce in the necessity which denounces our eternal separation.”
[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 “states [colonies,] reject and
renounce all allegiance and subjection to the kings of Great Britain,
and all others, who may hereafter claim by, through, or under them;
we utterly dissolve all political connexion which may heretofore have
subsisted between us and the parliament of Great Britain; and finally
we do assert” [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 connexion 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 Divine Providence,] we mutually
pledge to each other, our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honour.
THE END.
Transcriber’s Notes
Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made consistent when a
predominant preference was found in this book; otherwise they were not
changed; spelling variants were not changed.
Simple typographical errors were corrected; occasional unbalanced
quotation marks retained.
Ambiguous hyphens at the ends of lines were retained.
Page 185: the dates “1663” and “1773” must refer to two different
people.
Page 330: “IN CONGRESS, JULY 8, “1778” was misprinted as 1788”;
corrected here. Some apparently incorrect dates on other pages of the
original book have not been noted or corrected.