The Declaration of Independence was signed by the Second Continental Congress on July 4, 1776, breaking off ties between the American colonies and the British empire. This document emphasizes the natural right of the colonies to seek political independence and includes specific grievances against the British king and the failure of the British government. The Declaration of Independence is the central idea of the movie and is what drives the plot of the protagonist, Ben Franklin Gates, and his team to look for the legendary lost treasure of the Templar Knights with a map encoded on the back of the Declaration of Independence. To begin with, the most obvious discrepancy between the actual history and the movie, National Treasure 1, is the fact that there is no map leading to the treasure of the Knights Templar on the back of the Declaration of Independence. Although the Disney movie features a map on the back of the Declaration of Independence, there is only writing that reads “Original Declaration of Independence, dated 4th July 1776” on the bottom of the document, upside down. …show more content…
In the movie, he is presented as the Mason who has the last clue to the treasure of the Knights Templar. However, in reality, Carroll was a Catholic and Catholics were not permitted to join the Freemasons because “the Catholic Church banned – and still bans – Freemasonry in a bull promulgated by Pope Clement XII in 1738” (Sefton D. Temkin, Abraham Fellman). Freemasons were members of a secret society which cultivated a tradition of doctrines and symbols. The deism of Freemasonry contrasted Church doctrines and conservative Protestants and Jews believed the rituals of Freemasons contradicted their religious beliefs (Sefton D. Temkin, Abraham