Do you think today if America ever began losing its ability to decide what happens in our government that we could: “whenever any form of government becomes destructible of these ends it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute new government”? Are the words of Jefferson still possible today? What problems may make it more difficult than 1776?

The Declaration of Independence is generally regarded as one of the most famous documents in the history of the world. On June 10, 1776, the Continental Congress appointed a committee, consisting of Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, Roger Sherman and Robert R. Livingston to draft a Declaration of Independence.

Jefferson wrote out a rough draft of the Declaration, which was carefully revised by the committee and presented to Congress for adoption. After some further slight revisions by that body, it was adopted on July 4, 1776, at Philadelphia.

The parchment with the original signatures was deposited with the Department of State when the government was organized in 1789.

The original Declaration of Independence was transferred from the Department of State, by direction of the late President Warren G. Harding, to the Library of Congress. In 1952, at the direction of Congress, it was transferred to the National Archives Building, Washington, D.C., where it rests today.

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