Adams and Franklin were indeed the key FF's, but every time I read Jefferson's writing, I get goose bumps...just inspiring stuff. His talent for words helped ensure our Declaration was one of the greatest writings in history.
On 7/15/07, Gruss Gott <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Saw the play last night (kind of a semi-musical) and it was great, > although I could've stood for less music. But it was still really > good and taught me a bunch of things, reminding me of others: > > (1.) It's James Adams that should be considered the rightful founder > of the USA. Only at his badgering and engineering did the 13 colony > Continental Congress even discuss independence. > > (2.) The Declaration of Independence was written only as a stalling > tactic to continue the discussion - 6 of the 13 colonies were > unwilling to support independence and they had agreed that the vote > must be unanimous. Had the vote taken place, there would've been no > agreement so Adams suggested that those in favor of it should at least > write out why they wanted independence and was given 3 weeks to do so. > > (3.) Jefferson, young at the time (33), was picked to write the > Declaration mostly because he was the least politically offensive. > > (4.) It was through the reading and huge editing process that most of > the colonies were convinced to vote for independence. > > (5.) The largest compromise in the Declaration was slavery. The South > would not agree to the document without removing the section on > slavery, which Adams, Jefferson, and others felt was hypocritical > since oppression was the very reason for the declaration in the first > place. Begrudgingly Adams agreed to remove it only because Franklin > convinced him that, without a country, slavery would continue for > sure. > > (6.) Signing the Declaration was an uncommon act of courage: in doing > so, every signer was committing treason and subject to hanging. This > was especially risky because, at the time, the British were kicking > our ass and the 3-times daily reports coming in from Washington were > so dire that in all expectation the signers were dooming themselves. > Franklin famously remarked, "We must all hang together, or assuredly > we shall all hang separately." > > (7.) July 4th, of course, celebrates the completion and agreement of > the content of the declaration. > > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Deploy Web Applications Quickly across the enterprise with ColdFusion MX7 & Flex 2 Free Trial http://www.adobe.com/products/coldfusion/flex2/?sdid=RVJU Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Community/message.cfm/messageid:238392 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.5
