Compare And Contrast The Declaration Of Independence From The Original To The Final Draft

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When writing any sort of essay, letter, or declaration one always starts with a draft. A draft allows a person to fix grammatical mistakes, check tone, and to add or delete sections to help your overall work. The Declaration of Independence, one of America’s most important documents also went through a couple drafts before it was finally sent to the king. One significant change from the original draft to the final draft was the deletion of a passage about slavery. Many of us know that the intention of the declaration was to tell the King of England his transgressions against the colonies, and why the colonies wanted to break off from England. In both drafts Jefferson goes on to say how the king taxes the colonies without representation or allowing British soldiers to live in in a civilian's house just because. One thing that Jefferson mentions in the original draft that the greatest sin the crown has done to the colonies is slavery. Jefferson states,” He has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating its most sacred rights of life and liberty in the persons of a distant people who never offended him, captivating & carrying them into slavery in another hemisphere or to incur miserable death in their transportation thither.”. …show more content…

These types of rights Jefferson is referring to are the Lockean style of natural law. Everyone born has three unalienable and self evident rights: the right to life, the right to liberty, and the right to property. Self evident meaning it does not need to be explained and that it is obvious. By chaining people, moving them to a different place,and forcing them to work the king is taking away those unalienable rights. Now why would this section be removed from the final draft of the