borrows
heavily from the ideas of the Enlightenment to explicitly state the source of a government's
power. During the 17th and 18th centuries, European philosophers, such as John Locke and
Voltaire, wrote treatises on the basis of governmental power. , John Adams, and Benjamin
Franklin, the principal drafters of the Declaration of Independence, were very familiar with
Enlightenment thought and philosophy.
The Declaration of Independence
explicitly states the source of a government's power in its second paragraph. After stating that
people all have the God-given rights to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,"
it states that it is a government's main responsibility to secure and protect those rights for
its citizens. Furthermore, if a government cannot do this, it is the right and the
responsibility of the people to abolish the old government and create a new one.
...when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably
the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it
is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future
security.
The Declaration of Independence provides a long
list of abuses by the English King and Parliament. This is given as evidence that the rights of
the colonists were not being protected. Therefore, according to the framers of the Declaration
of Independence, the people are forming a new government to secure those rights.
In short, the Declaration of Independence says that the source of a government's power
comes from the citizens. They should have the power to decide who governs them, and it is up to
those in government to respect the most fundamental rights of the governed or risk being
overthrown and replaced.
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