The Birmingham age-herald., 1907-06-30

''prompt, frank, explicit and decisive upon committees and in conversation" and
 was looked upon by all of the older mem bers, searching for young talent, as one
 of the most promising young m4 Virginia had sent up. Particularly was he well re- garded for his abilities as writer. His public documents had become famous
 throughout the colonies, and one of them had circulated extensively in Great Britain. As the talent needed in the new
 committee was literary talent, 1t is evi- dent that Jefferson was promising se- lection.
 On the first meeting of the committee
 there seems to have been a little discus
 sion about who really should do the writ
 ing. Adams says he and Jefferson were selected by the committee, but that he 1 insisted that Jefferson himself do 1t. Jeff ferson denies this, and says that the com mittee pressed him alone to undertake the draft. This slight discrepancy in the
 memory of the two honorable gentlemen is of no importance; 1t was MT. Jefferson who wrote the declaration.
 He was living, at the time the task was
 given him, in house rather on the out skirts of Philadelphia, chosen purposely
 because the neighborhood was quiet. Here he had rented second floor. and was &C., customed to work whenever Congress
 was not In session. On coming up to
 Philadelphia on this trip one of his first tasks had been to go to a carpenter and give him a plan of desk he wanted
 made. The desk was fourteen inches long
 by ten in breadth and three in height, and 1t was on this that through the long June days he labored on the Declaration.
 It must be conceded by one who reads the contemporary literature of the Rev
 outon, that the gist of the document which he produced was in everybody's i mouth. The words, declaration of inde- pendence, had been heard for long time on all sides. Nothing was more firmly imbedded in the hearts of the people than their right to life, liberty, and the
 pursuit of happiness" nothing stronger than their conviction that governments
 exist to insure these rights and that they
 derive their just powers from the con-
 sent of the governed" The whole long
 list of grievances which Jefferson enumer- ates, and which makes up the body of the document, had been reported again
 and again from different parts of the country. What Jefferson did was to voice ! in the favorite English style of the day, ! the spirit of independence abroad, and to state formally the different grievances of
 the thirteen colonies as justification of
 revolution. It was a great document be-
 cause it expressed more completely than had yet been done a unuiversal convic- tion and because of the genius for se- lection which 1t showed. In no sense was it an invention.
 So well did Jefferson do his work that when he submitted it to Adams and
 Franklin. before handing 1t over to the committee, they made only few correc- tions. Jefftrson then wrote out what he calls a flair copy" and turned 1t over to the committee of five. They found it
 so good that they changed not word of it. and on the 18th of June the docu- ment was laid before Congress.
 While Jefferson in his little room at the corner of Market and Seventh street
 was laboring over the Declaration, the country from one end to the other was busy discussing the subject. In the states where the sentiment for independence was strong-that is, in New England and the south-the exultation was great, and the colonial congresses. sons of liberty, com mittees and town meetings worked with renewed energy, the excitement penetrat- ing to the most remote settlements. Heavy