9/24 The American Revolution
The Declaration of Independence
"That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to
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 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 the right to themselves by abolishing
the forms to which they are accustomed"(p.59)
In this passage
Jefferson says that the people being governed have the right to choose who
should governs them and what form of government should govern them. He also
makes it clear that the people should not “abolish” a form of government simply
because something goes wrong. Life is not perfect so neither will government.
Jefferson writes this passage because of his experience under an
autocratic government, where the people don't have a say in how they are governed.
An Address to the Inhabitants of the British Settlements in America, Upon Slave-Keeping
“We have many well attested anecdotes of as sublime and
disinterested virtue among them as ever adorned a Roman or a Christian
character. But we are to distinguish between an African in is own country and
an African in the state of slavery in America. Slavery is foreign to the human
mind, that the moral faculties, as well as those of the understanding are
debased, and rendered torpid by it. All the vices which are charged upon the
Negros in the southern colonies and the West-Indies, such as idleness, treachery,
theft, and the like are the genuine offspring of slavery, and serve as an
argument to prove that they were no intended by providence for it”(p.44).
In this passage Rush is making is point as
to why the enslaving of humans is naturally wrong. He states that “Negroes” are
as virtues as Europeans and to prove his point he ask his readers to compare an
African in his homeland and one that is enslaved in America. Rush is saying
this because he does not agree with the popular belief that Africans are
inferior to Europeans and all the faults (“vices”) that are associated with
slaves all stem from the burden of slavery.
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