The Rights Proclaimed
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peal resting on the claim of equal rights and the republican principle of
government by consent. The second, as seen in the text of the Declaration, was a constitutional argument that Americans were entitled to the
rights of Englishmen, and that those enumerated had been abridged by
the King-in-Parliament. These included the right of trial by jury, the right
of self-government, the right of taxation by consent, and the right against
quartering troops in private households. These and other legally recognized rights asserted in the Declaration found expression in the first State
constitutions and bills of rights and in the Federal Constitution and Bill
of Rights.
As reinterpreted by the descendants of the Founding Fathers, the
preamble of the Declaration became a two-edged sword. In the North it
came to embody the ideal of equality before the law or equal rights for
all Americans, whatever their race or color, and thus served as a springboard for the anti-slavery movement. In the South, however, the preamble was invoked to support secession, the theory being that the States in
1861, as in 1776, had a fundamental or natural right ‘‘to change their form
of government and institute a new government, whenever necessary for
their safety and happiness.’’ With the military defeat of the confederacy,
this ceased to play an important role in constitutional development. Beginning with the Thirteenth Amendment, the rhetoric of the preamble,
seeming to affirm the principle of equal rights, became the dominant
force, and over the years the Declaration of Independence has come to
symbolize opposition to both slavery and racial discrimination. Beyond
this, however, the influence of the Declaration from a constitutional standpoint is more difficult to ascertain. The Declaration offers little guidance
on how or in what ways governments ought to be built and provides little
insight into the workings of the American constitutional system. The
Declaration, after all, was a proclamation calling for independence, stating the grounds for separation, not a manual or design for a new political
system.
The Rights Proclaimed
The common theme of the various declarations issued by the Continental
Congress between 1774 and 1776 was the claim of equal rights, the ar-