Declaration Project

Declaration for Independence by the Inhabitants of Alford, Mass. — June 7, 1776

Editor’s note: This is what one might call a conditional declaration of independence — if the Second Continental Congress decides to sever ties with Britain, then the town of Alford, in Berkshire County, Massachusetts, “will support the measure with their lives and fortunes.” Declaration for Independence by the Inhabitants of Alford ALFORD, BERKSHIRE COUNTY (Mass.) At […]

Charles County, MD, declaration to declare independence (June 1776)

Editor’s Note: A first glance at the grievances enumerated here, and the language and tone in which they are presented, and you might think that Charles County took its cue from our July 4, 1776 Declaration of Independence — yet it was issued about a month before that famous document. Charles County, in the convention […]

Declaration of Independence – Town of Wrentham, Mass. (June 5, 1776)

Editor’s Note:  This eloquent declaration was issued by the denizens of Wrentham, MA, who possessed a “zeal for the common rights of mankind,” and were dismayed that the same “spirit of oppression” that prompted them to leave Britain in the first place has now pursued them in their new habitat.” And so they declared themselves “independent […]

Gageborough, MA, Declaration of Independence from Britain (June 7, 1776)

Editor’s Note: Prizing both brevity and independence as virtues in composition, Gageborough, MA, joins the 1776 declaration bandwagon on June, 7, 1776 Gageborough, MA, Declaration of Independence  At a meeting of the inhabitants of the town of Gageborough, agreeable to a resolve of the House of Representatives, of June 7, 1776, requesting the several Towns […]

Natick, MA, Declaration of Independence, June 20, 1776

Editor’s Note: Short and sweet, this declaration of independence from Britain, by the town of Natick, Massachusetts, preceded our July 4, 1776 Declaration by a little over two weeks.  The concise document packs quite a punch, slamming Britain for “the glaring impropriety, incapacity, and fatal tendency… at the distance of three thousand miles, to legislate […]

Charles County, Maryland, Declaration of Independence

Editor’s Note: One of the last state and local declarations to be issued before the Second Continential Congress, led by Jefferson, got to work making a declaration of its own — one that history would characterize as the declaration to end all declarations — Maryland was one of the last to come aboard the independence […]

Buckingham County, VA, Declaration of Independence (June 14, 1776)

Editor’s Note: This declaration of independence was one of scores that was issued by states and localities in the months following the publication of Thomas Paine’s influential and rabble-rousing Common Sense.  These declarations in turn informed our July 4, 1776 document. This statement, or declaration, was published in the Virginia Gazette on June 14, 1776, and was likely issued […]

Spanish Translation of July 4, 1776 Declaration of Independence

From Semanario Político, Económico y Literario, Dec. 12, 1821. Cuando en el curso de los acontecimientos humanos se hace necesario para un pueblo disolver los lazos políticos que le han unido con otro y asumir entre los poderes de la tierra, el rango separado é igual, para el cual lo habilitan las leyes de la naturaleza […]