The Declaration of Indepenence

By Allison Sheedy

The Declaration of Independence was a great way of cutting off ties with Britain. It didn’t involve violence (at least not to my knowledge) and is a great example of ‘reason’ versus threat of violence, etc. You know, what we talked about in class on Tuesday. I found it to be successful in communicating the intended message but not intimidating. It was written well and obviously crafted through a lot of hard work because of how inclusive and specific it is. The way it defines all of the conditions, terms, and issues appear to have been carefully picked out and not just added as afterthoughts.

It was a little repetitive, I admit, but I liked the style. While it appeared overwhelming and wordy, it was kind of humorous. The listing of all the wrongs the King of Britain had committed against them almost sounded like a little brother pointing out his older sister’s faults. I don’t mean this in a bad way, just that the emphasis by using the same repetitive style was definitely interesting while important. It catches your eye and brings attention to what it says.

I think the Thomas Jefferson did an excellent job on the Declaration of Independence. While he did not provide examples in his listing of the wrongs that the King of Britain did (which would have made it a lot stronger but perhaps might have deviated from the message), it did effectively get us to be independent from Britain which was the intended goal.