Declaration of War on Poverty in America (1964)
Editor’s Note: This declaration was not written on parchment, but rather was issued about halfway through President Johnson’s first State of the Union Address. It was LBJ’s opening salvo in “unconditional war on poverty in America.” Johnson considered it vital “to declare war on a domestic enemy which threatens the strength of our nation and […]
Act of Abjuration – Dutch Declaration of Independence, July 26, 1581
Editor’s Note: This is often referred to as the first modern declaration of independence, in which the people disown their king. There are many telling similarities between this document, and its compelling case for dispensing with what it perceives as monarchical tyranny, and our July 4, 1776 Declaration of Independence — and to this day […]
Declaration of Sentiments of the American Anti-Slavery Convention, 1833.
Editor’s Note: The prominent abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison asserts in this declaration, the composition of which he spearheaded, that slavery is a moral evil and that “every American citizen, who detains a human being in involuntary bondage as his property, is, according to Scripture, (Ex. xxi. 16,) a man-stealer”. Garrison’s, whose deeds matched his rhetoric, co-founded the […]
UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (2009)
Editor’s Note: On September 13, 2007, this ground-breaking declaration was approved by the UN General Assembly, with 144 states voting in favor, with four — the U.S., Canada, New Zealand and Australia, which have large indigenous populations — voting against, and with 11 states abstaining. Australia endorsed the document, which is not legally binding, on […]
Declaration of Rights for Cetaceans: Whales and Dolphins (2010)
Editor’s Note: This declaration, which spells out what it maintains should be the legal rights under international law of whales and dolphins, is a product of the Helsinki Group, formed, as the website issuing the document says, “out of the ‘Cetacean Rights: Fostering Moral and Legal Change Conference,’ held in Helsinki, Finland in May 2010, […]
‘Declarations of our humble opinion respecting the most essential rights and liberties of the colonists’ (Declaration of Rights of Stamp Act Congress) — Declaration of Rights and Grievances, October 19, 1765
Editor’s Note: These resolutions are described by the First Continental Congress as tantamount to “declarations of our humble opinion, respecting the most essential rights and liberties Of the colonists, and of the grievances under which they labour, by reason of several late Acts of Parliament.” The aim is “to procure the repeal of the Act […]
Declaration of Rights and Grievances, October 14, 1774
Editor’s Note: Well over a year and a half before our July 4, 1776 Declaration of Independence was issued, our First Continental Congress came out with a declaration — of rights and grievances — that was prepared and sent to King George III in England, where it promptly fell upon deaf ears, and as a […]
Declaration of Food Sovereignty – Sedgewick, Maine (2011)
Editor’s Note: In March 2011, the Maine town of Sedgewick became the first of four municipalities to pass an ordinance that effectively amounted to a declaration of food sovereignty, one that effectively gives them the right to “a local food system” food that’s sustainable, organic, local; that promotes self-reliance; and that provides an alternative to […]
New Hampshire Declaration of Independence (June 15, 1776)
Editor’s Note: With the inauspicious title of “Committee,” New Hampshire’s chambers declared independence “with the example of several of the most respectable of our sister Colonies before us for entering upon that most important step, of a disunion from Great Britain, and declaring ourselves free and independent of the Crown”, impelled as they were “by the […]
Talbot County, Maryland, Instructions for Independence (June 7, 1776)
Editor’s Note: If ever there was a declaration that shows how sentiments for independence at the most local level can drive its state delegates to do the right thing and join the other colonies in breaking from Britain, this is it. When the Second Continental Congress first considered, on June 7, 1776, Richard Henry Lee’s […]
