Declaration Of Independence Dbq Essay

“All men are created equal” was a goal the Founding Fathers tried to achieve in forming the country. July 4, 1776, 56 delegated passed the Declaration of Independence to announce and explain separation from Great Britain. James Madison wrote the Constitution based off the ideas of the Enlightenment period, which had core ideas of personal liberty. The U.S. Constitution established America’s national government and fundamental laws and guaranteed certain basic rights for its citizens. The Constitution was signed on September 17, 1787, by delegates in Philadelphia and presided over by George Washington. Our history does not reflect the words of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution because as a nation we have discriminated against

For example, Andrew Jackson was asking the Native Americans to leave because he wanted the United States to have more land and more money from selling the land to citizens. However, by doing this Jackson forced the Native Americans to leave their homes. The Native Americans were not given any rights even though they were there first and rightfully owned the land. This created a bad relationship between the Native Americans and the Americans. This action that Jackson did went against the Constitution (Source C). Another example is where a photo of a slave was badly beaten from being whipped on his back for no reason at all, and usually masters or owners would not stop the beatings until they inflicted significant injuries. Additionally, slaves were looked as property, not people. Slaves did not have the ability to enjoy freedom because they had work long hours and be whipped for not doing their jobs (Source D). These two groups of people, Native Americans and slaves were not treated fairly and no one gave them respect even though this country was founded on "all men treated

For example, during the Whiskey Rebellion, a tax was put on distilled liquors in 1791, which farmers in western Pennsylvania believed was unfair. This rebellion was a tax protest and was started by farmers who were being taxed for their crops to help pay for the Revolutionary War (Source B). It resulted in a strengthening of the recently established United States because the federal government demonstrated its ability to keep the union together. Another example is Manifest Destiny, a period of American expansion that the United States not only could but was "destined to," stretch from coast to coast. The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, which ended the Mexican-American War in 1848, added new territory to the US which included all or parts of what is now California, Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada, Utah, and Wyoming. The rapid territorial expansion resulted not only in war with Mexico, but also in the dislocation of, brutal mistreatment to, and fights with Native American occupants of the territories now being occupied by the United States. United State expansion also fueled the growing debate over slavery, raising the question of whether new states being admitted to the Union would allow slavery or not—a conflict that would eventually lead to the Civil War, which is another example of not being able to keep. (Source E). The