Our Nations Forefathers - The Three Documents that Made America: The Declaration of Independence, The Constitution, and the Bill of Rights

F IRST EBOOK EDITION 2012 BY A UDIO G O

A LL R IGHTS R ESERVED .

T RADE ISBN 978-1-62064-196-5

L IBRARY ISBN 978-0-7927-9092-1

A RTWORK BY S AM F INK

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My name is Sam Fink. Im 87 years old and one lucky man. I was born in America. That came about because two sets of grandparents came here in 1880. Word had gotten to their villages in Russia and Poland that America was a country where freedom and opportunity reign. They arrived penniless and spoke no English. All they had were their good names and a desire to make a new life. In time they found what they had come for. They knew nothing about what made America the land of the free and the home of the brave. In time, they found out. They raised a total of thirteen children. All of them found a place in society. They discovered through public education that there were three documents that made such a life possible the Declaration of Independence of 1776, the Constitution of the United States of America of 1787 and the Bill of Rights of 1791. We know man cannot stand erect without a backbone. Neither can a nation. These three documents are the backbone of America. As you read the ideas expressed in these documents you will begin to understand what took place when a miracle came to life. In the Declaration of Independence you will see the logic, the sharp reasoning for the desire of the colonies to break away from Great Britain. The words were from the pen of Thomas Jefferson one of the most skillful writers of his day. When 56 men signed the Declaration, Ben Franklin said we must all hang together or surely we will all hang separately. Clearly it was a revolution, and they did hang together to win their independence by defeating the British in the Revolutionary War five years later.

The second of the three documents is the Constitution of the United States of America, adopted and passed in 1787. At the heart of its brilliance was the ability of 55 delegates who met in Philadelphia to draft a set of ideas and laws under which we still live today. Their efforts were almost perfect almost, because in a matter of two years they decided that something was missing. What? They forgot to include laws that would guarantee individual liberty. To raise the government to the highest ideals of personal freedom they wrote and passed 10 laws, all of which guaranteed each individual their personal liberties. Those 10 amendments to the Constitution became the Bill of Rights and it proved that nothing is perfect - there is always room for improvement. In fact, there are now a total of 27 amendments.

For over 225 years these three documents have been the backbone of the United States of America. We are over 290 million strong now, a diverse people living the same freedoms and opportunities my ancestors, my children and I have lived.

In June of 1776 the second Continental Congress met in the old statehouse in Philadelphia. Delegates from New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware, Virginia, North and South Carolina and Georgia made up the assembly. They met to discuss the idea of breaking away from England to be independent and to govern themselves. England had continually turned a deaf ear to their pleas for justice and better representation. Had you been there you would have sensed their determination: what was being considered was a revolution. To pursue their idea they needed a document to express their reasons for wanting independence. On the 7th of June, Richard Henry Lee of Virginia made a resolution that the 13 colonies should be free and independent states. Needed was a declaration. A committee of five was needed for the job Jefferson, Adams, Ben Franklin, Roger Sherman and Robert Livingston were appointed. They put the onus on Jefferson, apparently the best writer in the group. Jefferson spent about two weeks on the declaration before presenting it. Corrections and additions were called for. Jefferson returned to his quarters, incorporated what he had heard and revised the Declaration.

On June 28th he and his colleagues returned with the completed Declaration of Independence. Eighty-six changes had been made before a final approval. All of the delegates voted aye, except New York, who had not received instructions to proceed. But they did vote aye on the 15th of July, making the vote unanimous. The Declaration was approved and accepted on the 2nd of July and made public on the 4th. There was no celebration, no cheers, no applause for this daring act, which launched a war that lasted five years and ended in the birth of a new country, America.

IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable 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, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, 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 sufferance 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 absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good. He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.