(9 of 10)
Thus the lengthy middle section of the Declaration never mentions Parliament by name—a curious but absolutely necessary omission. Instead, it is a long litany of the King's offenses, made especially effective by relentless repetition:
"He has refused his assent to laws the most wholesome and necessary for the public good... He has dissolved representative houses repeatedly and continually for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people... He has obstructed the administration of justice by refusing his assent to laws for establishing judiciary powers ... He has kept among us in times of peace standing armies without the consent of our legislatures ... He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns and destroyed the lives of our people."
The list of 27 charges against King George is in some ways polemical and exaggerated. Its intent, however, is not a strict and balanced accuracy but a maximum political effect to justify the conclusion: "A prince whose character is thus marked by every act winch may define a tyrant is unfit to be a ruler of a free people." The case thus stated, the Declaration stirringly ends with the words of Richard Henry Lee's June 7 resolution that the Colonies should be "free and independent."
Such at least is the document as finally endorsed by the Congress on July 4. Jefferson's draft went through a long editing process, although the document remains essentially ins. First he submitted his rough draft to Franklin, who made one or two minor changes and passed the document along to Adams, who made one of his two changes and then made a copy for himself. Jefferson took the draft back, revised it somewhat, submitted it again to Franklin and Adams, and finally laid it before the whole Committee of Five, winch made no other changes. Jefferson then made a fair copy, and without further change it was presented to the Congress on June 28.
On July 2, after the vote for independence, Congress pushed on to consider the Declaration. The process continued for two more days, with Jefferson sitting nervously silent. For propriety's sake, he never rose to defend a word or thought in the document; John Adams undertook that task and argued the case against all critics. Sometimes, however, the critics proved victorious.
At the end of his long list of grievances, Jefferson, a slaveowner himself, inserted a somewhat illogical passage vitriolically accusing the King of abetting the slave trade and thus waging "cruel war against human nature itself and violating its most sacred rights of life and liberty." In deference to the delegates from South Carolina and Georgia, the passage was struck. In his complaint about foreign soldiers being used against the Colonies, Jefferson referred to "Scotch and other mercenaries," a phrase that angered one or two Scotsmen in the Congress. Thus "Scotch" was deleted from the Declaration.