The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1926-07-05
BY Ruth Finney
Times staff Correspondent

story.
BY Ruth Finney
Times Staff CORRESPONDENT
PHILADELPHIA, July 4, 1776.-
Fifty-siX members of the Continental
Congress today committed themselves
irrevocably to the cause of liberty
by signing their names to the Decla-
ration of independence.
The Declaration, slightly modified
from the first draft, was read to
the Congress by Benjamin Harrison,
and was approved without objection.
Copies Of 1t will be distributed at
once SO that it may be proclaimed
in each of the United States and at
the heads of tie armies.
The Document
The Declaration reads:
When, in the course Of human
events, it becomes necessary for one
people to dissolve the political bands
which have connected them with an
other, and to assume, among the
powers Of the earth, the separate
and equal station to which the laws
Of nature and of natures God en-
title them, a decent respect of the
opinions of mankind requires that
they should declare the causes which
impel them to the separation.
Self-Eyident Truths
We hold these truths to be self
evident: That all men are created
equal; that they are endowed by
their Creator with certain inaliena-
BILE rights; that among these are life,
liberty and the pursuit Of happiness.
That, to secure these rights, govern
ments are instituted among men, de-
irving their just powers from the
consent of the governed that, when
ever any form Of government be-
destructive of these ends it is
the right of the people to alter or
to abolish it and to institute a new
government, laying it's foundation on
such principles, and organizing its
powers in such form, as to them
shall seem most likely to affect their
safety and happiness. Prudence, in
deed, will dictate that governments
lOllS COldDllOIlCu OllOQio bOS ~
changed for light and transient
causes; and accordingly all expert
ence hath shown that mankind is
more disposed to suffer while evils
are sufferable, than to right them
selves by a~bolishing the forms to
which they are accustomed.
Security the Object.
But when a long train of abuses
and usurpations, pursuing invari-
ably the same object, evinces~ a
design to reduce them under abso-
lutte despotion. 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 suffer-
ance 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 alb
solute tyranny over these states. To
prove this, let facts be submitted to
a candid world.
He has refused his assentsto laws
the most wholesome and necessary
for the public good.
Duties Neglected
He has forbidden his governors to
pass laws Of immediate and press
ing Importance unless suspended in
their operation till his assent should
be obtained; and, when SO sus-
pended, he has utterly neglected to
to them.
He has refused to pass other laws
for the accommodation Of large dis
tricts of people, unless those peo-
pie would relincuish the right Of
representation in the legislature-a
right inestimable to them, and for
midable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative
at places unusual, uncomfort-
able, and distant from the deposit
tory of their public records for the
sole purpose Of fatiguing them into
compliance with his measure.
Assemblies Dissolved
He has dissolved representative
houses repeatedly for opposing, with
manly frmness, 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 an
Inhalation, have returned to the peo-
pie at large for their exercise; the
state remaining in the meantime,
exposed to all the dangers Of in
vasions from without and con-
vulSions within.
He has endeavored to prevent the
population of these States; for that
purpose obstructing the law for the
naturalization of foreigners refus-
ing to pass others to encourage their
migration hither and raising the con-