Only men who were deeply convinced of the righteousness
of their cause would have found the courage to take
the momentous decision of the months of June and July of
the year 1776.
In June, Richard Henry Lee of Virginia proposed a motion
to the Continental Congress that ``these united colonies
are, and of right ought to be, free and independent states, that
they are absolved from all allegiance to the British crown, and
that all political connection between them and the state of
Great Britain is and ought to be, totally dissolved.''
The motion was seconded by John Adams of Massachusetts.
It was carried on July the second and on July fourth,
it was followed by an official Declaration of Independence,
which was the work of Thomas Jefferson, a serious and exceedingly
capable student of both politics and government and
destined to be one of the most famous of out American presidents.
When news of this event reached Europe, and was followed
by the final victory of the colonists and the adoption of
the famous Constitution of the year 1787 (the first of all written
constitutions) it caused great interest. The dynastic system
of the highly centralised states which had been developed
after the great religious wars of the seventeenth century had
reached the height of its power. Everywhere the palace of
the king had grown to enormous proportions, while the cities
of the royal realm were being surrounded by rapidly growing
acres of slums.
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