The Declaration of Independence, adopted by the Second Continental Congress on July 4, 1776, remains the most consequential political document in American history. Drafted principally by Thomas Jefferson of Virginia and revised by John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, and the full Congress, it announced that the thirteen colonies were “free and independent States” absolved of allegiance to the British Crown. For Native nations, however, the document carried a double edge: it proclaimed universal natural rights while simultaneously indicting King George III for failing to restrain colonial expansion into Indigenous homelands — a grievance that framed Native peoples as instruments of British policy rather than sovereign nations in their own right. Understanding that contradiction is essential to reading 1776 honestly.
Jefferson’s Early Career and the Enlightenment Mind
Thomas Jefferson was born into one of the most prominent families in Virginia through his mother’s line. He studied at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg and began practicing law in 1767. A year later he stood for the Virginia House of Burgesses, entering the legislature precisely as colonial opposition to British taxation hardened. That same year he began building Monticello, his hilltop estate in Albemarle County — a plantation whose later expansion in land and enslaved people came largely through his marriage to Martha Wayles Skelton in 1772.
Jefferson’s intellectual formation drew directly on Enlightenment political philosophy: natural rights, consent of the governed, and the contractual limits of monarchy. In 1774 he wrote “A Summary View of the Rights of British America,” arguing that the colonies were tied to the king only by voluntary bonds of loyalty. Published as a pamphlet without his permission, it carried his reputation beyond Virginia and established him as an eloquent voice for independence. In the spring of 1775, after skirmishes at Lexington and Concord, the Virginia legislature sent him to the Second Continental Congress in Philadelphia.
At the Second Continental Congress: From Lee’s Resolution to Committee of Five
By late spring 1776, sentiment had shifted decisively. In mid-May, eight of the thirteen colonies declared they would support independence. On June 7, 1776, Richard Henry Lee of Virginia formally presented what became known as the Lee Resolution, stating that “these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States” and that all political connection with Great Britain “is, and ought to be, totally dissolved.”
On June 11, Congress appointed a five-man committee to draft a formal justification of the break: Jefferson, John Adams of Massachusetts, Roger Sherman of Connecticut, Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania, and Robert R. Livingston of New York. Jefferson was the only southerner on the committee, and he had arrived in Philadelphia accompanied by three of the many people he enslaved. Despite being a shy and awkward public speaker, he was given the drafting task. In an 1823 account he recalled that the other members “unanimously pressed on myself alone to undertake the draught,” that he communicated it separately to Franklin and Adams for corrections, and then reported a fair copy to the committee and “unaltered to the Congress.”
The continuity of Indigenous diplomatic practice stands as a parallel and often overlooked reference point: many of the era’s political texts and borderland agreements drew on or collided with long-established treaty traditions, documented in resources such as the wampum belts that recorded Haudenosaunee agreements.
“We Hold These Truths to Be Self-Evident”: The Preamble and Its Grievances
Jefferson’s draft contained a long list of grievances against the Crown, but it was the preamble that struck the deepest chord: “We hold these truths to be self-evident; that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable 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.”
The Twenty-Seven Grievances — Including the “Merciless Indian Savages” Clause
The rhetorical force of the preamble existed alongside a passage that has troubled scholars ever since. Among the indictments of King George III was the claim that he had “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.” This language served a political calculus: by casting Native nations as Crown proxies rather than sovereign powers with their own diplomatic interests, the Declaration helped justify continental expansion. In reality, many Indigenous nations were independent actors balancing British, French, Spanish, and colonial interests — a dynamic explored in accounts of the Proclamation of 1763 and its legacy and in the deeper record of first contact between Europeans and Native Americans.
The Continental Congress reconvened on July 1. The next day, twelve of the thirteen colonies adopted Lee’s resolution. Deliberation and revision continued through July 3 and into the late morning of July 4, during which Congress deleted or altered roughly one-fifth of Jefferson’s text — including heavy editing of the slavery grievance, which was struck entirely. The preamble survived untouched, and the core document remained Jefferson’s words. Congress officially adopted the Declaration on the Fourth of July. Most historians now accept that the engrossed parchment was not signed until August 2, 1776.
The Men Who Signed the Declaration of Independence
Delegates from all thirteen colonies eventually signed. All were male white landowners, and two would become president. The document’s signatories included:
- Connecticut: Samuel Huntington, Roger Sherman, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott
- Delaware: George Read, Caesar Rodney, Thomas McKean
- Georgia: Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton
- Maryland: Charles Carroll, Samuel Chase, Thomas Stone, William Paca
- Massachusetts: John Adams, Samuel Adams, John Hancock, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry
- New Hampshire: Josiah Bartlett, William Whipple, Matthew Thornton
- New Jersey: Abraham Clark, John Hart, Francis Hopkinson, Richard Stockton, John Witherspoon
- New York: Lewis Morris, Philip Livingston, Francis Lewis, William Floyd
- North Carolina: William Hooper, John Penn, Joseph Hewes
- Pennsylvania: George Clymer, Benjamin Franklin, Robert Morris, John Morton, Benjamin Rush, George Ross, James Smith, James Wilson, George Taylor
- Rhode Island: Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery
- South Carolina: Edward Rutledge, Arthur Middleton, Thomas Lynch Jr., Thomas Heyward Jr.
- Virginia: Richard Henry Lee, Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Jefferson, George Wythe, Thomas Nelson Jr.
John Hancock’s outsized signature gave the English language the idiom “put your John Hancock here.” Notably absent from the signing body were Native representatives, women, enslaved people, and any delegate representing Indigenous sovereignty.
Jefferson After 1776: Legacy, Contradiction, and the Native Record
Jefferson was not recognized as the Declaration’s principal author until the 1790s; the document had originally been presented as a collective effort of the Continental Congress. He returned to the Virginia legislature in late summer 1776, succeeded Franklin as minister to France in 1785, served as Secretary of State under George Washington, and led a Republican party championing states’ rights against Alexander Hamilton’s Federalists. Elected third president in 1800, he served two terms, during which the nation doubled its territory through the Louisiana Purchase of 1803. He died on July 4, 1826 — hours before John Adams — on the fiftieth anniversary of the Declaration’s adoption.
His legacy remains layered. Critics point to his admitted racism and the views he expressed about African Americans, common to wealthy Virginia planters of his era. DNA evidence supports much-disputed claims regarding a longstanding relationship with Sally Hemings, one of the women he enslaved, and several children born of it. Toward Native nations, his presidential policies advanced removal — a trajectory examined in the record of the Indian Removal Act of 1830 and the forced removal of southeastern nations. The Declaration’s universal language and the policies of the man who wrote it stand in unresolved tension.
Historical Context & Key Cultural Takeaways
The Declaration of Independence functions on two levels simultaneously. As political philosophy, it advanced the radical claim that legitimate government derives from the consent of the governed — a principle that would later be invoked by abolitionists, suffragists, and Indigenous sovereignty advocates alike. As practical statecraft, however, its twenty-seven grievances framed Native nations as hostile instruments of British power, laying rhetorical groundwork for expansion across the continent. The document’s adoption on July 4, 1776, its formal signing on August 2, and Jefferson’s eventual recognition as author in the 1790s are all well-documented milestones. What remains less frequently taught is that for Native nations, the same summer that produced an argument against monarchy also produced a rationale for dispossession — a contradiction that successive generations of Indigenous leaders would use the Declaration’s own words to contest.
Frequently Asked Questions
Who actually wrote the Declaration of Independence?
Thomas Jefferson drafted the document in June 1776 as a member of a five-man committee. John Adams and Benjamin Franklin offered corrections before it reached Congress, which then revised roughly one-fifth of the text. Jefferson was not publicly credited as principal author until the 1790s.
When was the Declaration adopted versus signed?
Congress adopted the Declaration on July 4, 1776, after adopting Richard Henry Lee’s resolution for independence on July 2. Most historians accept that the engrossed parchment was signed on August 2, 1776.
How did the Declaration address Native Americans?
It addressed them once, in a grievance accusing King George III of inciting “merciless Indian Savages” against frontier colonists. This framing treated Native nations as British proxies rather than independent sovereigns — a rhetorical move that helped justify subsequent colonial and American expansion.
What changes did Congress make to Jefferson’s draft?
Congress cut or altered roughly one-fifth of the text. The most significant deletion was a lengthy grievance blaming the king for the slave trade. The preamble, including “all men are created equal,” survived unchanged.
How many delegates signed, and who were they?
Fifty-six delegates eventually signed, representing all thirteen colonies. All were male white landowners; two — John Adams and Thomas Jefferson — later became president. John Hancock’s large signature produced a lasting American idiom.
Concluding Synthesis: A Founding Text and Its Unfinished Argument
The Declaration of Independence endures because its preamble articulates a standard that no subsequent American institution has fully met. That gap — between the promise of 1776 and the reality of continued dispossession, enslavement, and exclusion — is not a footnote to the document’s history; it is central to it. For students of Native and Indigenous history, the Declaration is best read as both an achievement and a warning: a text whose universal claims have repeatedly been used by Indigenous nations, from treaty councils to the twentieth-century sovereignty movement, to hold the United States to its own stated principles.
Preservation of the Declaration itself — the engrossed parchment held at the National Archives in Washington, D.C. — parallels the broader preservation work surrounding Indigenous historical records, from wampum belts to treaty documents and oral chronicles. Both bodies of material carry legal and spiritual weight, and both are engaged by descendant communities and scholars working to ensure the historical record is told accurately and completely.
