Well, I do Declare

I was bored today, and decided to read the declaration of independence. The language is a little flowery, so I interpreted it for you. I'm all about enhancing the knowledge experience like dat.

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When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. (ed note: yo, England, we're outta here, and here's why)

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But 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. — Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. (Ed note: we deserve as humans to be free and happy. We're not, and even though we KNOW that overthrowing a longstanding government will be difficult, we're going to do it anyhow, because being miserable slaves to a worn-out system of government doesn't work for us!)

The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world. ( ed note: these here are the reasons why we hate the King)

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good. (won't say yes to what our governors want)

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them. (won't pay attention to the government, not matter what they do)

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only. (taxation without representation, anyone?)

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures. (he's petty little squinch, isn't he, making us trot all round the land for a stupid MEETING?)

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people. (like a child with building blocks, really, toppling them in anger if they don't make the castles of his dreams all by themselves. You there! Government! I shall stomp you out if you do naughty things to me!)

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within. (no government means no problems for the king, but the people will suffer if someone else should like to come on down and take over. We're HELPLESS here!)

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands. (and while he's at it, he's not even letting people come here! The nerve! It's all whimsy, really!)

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers. (we're right back at the beginning complaint. Bears repeating)

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries. (damned egomaniacal puppetteer, picking and choosing the men to judge those for whom they have no knowledge!)

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance. (big government = bad. NIMBY, kingly dood)

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures. (peacekeepers? feh! Babysitters, I say. I don't much care for it, either. Jackbooted thugs!)

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power. (supreme military power? that's almost NEVER a good thing)

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us (not OUR armies, for we can't HAVE one):

For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States (because, really, holding court on your OWN military and pardoning them even when their guilt was assured is cheap and cowardly):

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world (fekking embargoes. Damned pirates. Cursed taxes, liens, and inculcations!):

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent (because we'd really like to agree to pay more, if we knew that some good would come out of the taxes other than a simple further lining of the fur pockets of the filthy rich KoE, who is a mad hatter of a baby man):

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury (every man deserves to be heard out in court before a jury of his peers, not to be judged by the despotic appointees of the King, who owe him politically and financially):

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences (when in fact a nice courthouse in the town square filled with elected judges and sensible neighbors would likely do a more apt job of rendering sentence than some out of touch addlemaniacal slob of a elistist English JUDGE would, plus which - think of the costs of shipping to be saved!):

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies (Canada's a MESS, man!)

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments (because we worked very very hard on our laws, they worked, and we want them back):

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever (we are not children, we have made it here in this forbidding and strange land for over a hundred years, and believe that the system of self-government established here had led to the generation of a sensible system of free men operation in a democratic and deliberate fashion, which should be the ideal of mankind the world over).

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us. (not very nice, considering he won't let anyone come over here to help out. Hardly a fair fight, now IS it?)

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people. (he's a naughty king. we hate him very very much)

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation. (we think he's running scared, and so now is taking on all manner of men of ill-repute to try to scare us into compliance. Well, Buster, you aint' seen NOTHIN' yet, and if it comes down to fighting you and your hordes of hired hands in the streets with pointed sticks, that's what we'll do to get OUT point across, you stinky-breathed milquetoast!)

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands. (Conscription? Is wrong. That is all)

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions. (and we were just making nice-nice with them too, until HE came along and promised them shiny things.)

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people. (we want to be HEARD, to be respected, and we get nowhere. This just isn't sustainable)

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends. (we didn't leave to be a British colony, after all. To be held by them in fiduciary and familial sway is an offense. We are free and independent! No amount of blood relation between us and Those of English blood can be taken to mean we are England's belongings. We were meant to be free, from the beginning.)

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, 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; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. — And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor. ( we swear to God that we are free men, of one country, united as states in countryhood, with all the rights assigned thereto, and are not British citizens from this point onward. So there, you two-bit ermine-swaddled nancyman! Neener neener neener!)

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Dubious history lesson - OVER. Hope you learned something.