Ideals Of The Declaration Of Independence Essay

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The Declaration of Independence is a very important document in American history. It was adopted on July 4th, 1776 and helped the 13 American colonies separate from Great Britain and become their own nation. This also meant that they could express their own beliefs and have their own government to make decisions. In this declaration, there were four key ideals expressed. These ideals were the right to equality, the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, the consent of the governed, and to alter or abolish government. The most important ideal of the Declaration of Independence is the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, also known as unalienable rights. Without these rights, people would not be able to make their…show more content…
This ideal of equality is basically a summary of all the other ideals, in the way that everyone is created equal, therefore must have equal rights. More importantly are the rights themselves, such as life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Equality goes hand in hand with all the other ideals, but not the main principle. “They are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty and pursuit of happiness.” (Document A) This evidence shows how important unalienable rights and that equality is just tied into the conclusion of other ideals or rights. The other two ideals of the Declaration of Independence are consent of the governed and the right to alter or abolish government. Consent of the governed means that the “the people” play a part in the the government and help run it, the government does not run the people. The right to abolish government means that if the people do not like the way the government is being ran, they have the right to change it (Consent of the governed). While these are both very important ideas for our country, they could never outweigh the ideal of basic human rights. Nothing could ever be more important than

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