A Period is Questioned in the Declaration of Independence – IOTW Report

A Period is Questioned in the Declaration of Independence

from NYTimes

-leading to leftist historians to the consensus that Thomas Jefferson and the Founders intended that a a vigorous government was needed to protect individual rights. *head*desk*

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Every Fourth of July, some Americans sit down to read the Declaration of Independence, reacquainting themselves with the nation’s founding charter exactly as it was signed by the Second Continental Congress in 1776.

Or almost exactly? A scholar is now saying that the official transcript of the document produced by the National Archives and Records Administration contains a significant error — smack in the middle of the sentence beginning “We hold these truths to be self-evident,” no less.

The error, according to Danielle Allen, a professor at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, N.J., concerns a period that appears right after the phrase “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” in the transcript, but almost certainly not, she maintains, on the badly faded parchment original.

DECLARATION-master315

That errant spot of ink, she believes, makes a difference, contributing to what she calls a “routine but serious misunderstanding” of the document.

The period creates the impression that the list of self-evident truths ends with the right to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,” she says. But as intended by Thomas Jefferson, she argues, what comes next is just as important: the essential role of governments — “instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed” — in securing those rights.

The logic of the sentence moves from the value of individual rights to the importance of government as a tool for protecting those rights,” Ms. Allen said. “You lose that connection when the period gets added.”

Correcting the punctuation, if indeed it is wrong, is unlikely to quell the never-ending debates about the deeper meaning of the Declaration of Independence. But scholars who have reviewed Ms. Allen’s research say she has raised a serious question.  [ MORE ]

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“Hey Lefty! Yeah. You. The Declaration of Independence doesn’t need correcting. You do.”

24 Comments on A Period is Questioned in the Declaration of Independence

  1. Academia strikes again! Knowing anything about the founding fathers, what they read, what they wrote, what they did leaves no doubt this is garbage. The simple fact that America was founded as a Republic, protecting citizens from their government should give this bint a clue.

  2. People for centuries have been trying to debunk Scriptures too and NO ONE has succeeded legitimately.

    Do not be surprised then that there will always be people who wish to use any and every pretzel logic to make the Declaration of Independence to mean what they interpret or wish it to mean.

    To them I say….You cannot change that which is Divinely inspired, nor can you alter a covenant made with G-d…so… BITE ME

  3. Never mind that long line and the following phrase ‘That in order to secure these liberties governments are’. She also fails to see the structure of a resolution often with a introductory section followed by enumeration of clauses usually beginning with ‘whereas’. In this case ‘that’ is used.

    So the basic framework is this:

    We hold these truths to be self-evident…
    That to secure these rights we have government.
    That if it fails we have a right to change it..
    Prudence requires this isn’t done lightly….
    But if the abuses are egregious it is required.
    Such has been the case here…

    Amazing what the low-level of intellect and historical context is required to be employed as a Democrat scholar.

  4. A prog has a desired result and convalutes truth to get there.

    This is the humpty dumpty approach to facts.

    In 100 years, Jefferson will still be revered. And this slag a footnote on some great nephew’s ancestry page.

  5. Jesus… The progtard prevarication machine must be getting really desperate now. Someone please remind those shit heads that the Declaration of Independence carries exactly zero weight in regards to determining if something is legal or not; a civil right or not… none.

  6. Heck, she should have continued a little further….”.. 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,…..”
    ‘…becomes destructive of these ends,….(and)..it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it..’
    When those who trust in their GOD given rights Finally get back in power, THEN we can abolish these ‘executive orders’ and the worst one, The Un-Affordable Care Act!
    To God Be The Glory!

  7. If she – or any of the other “scholars” did even the slightest bit of research, she would know that Jefferson wary of government and was ADAMANTLY against anything but a minimal role for government and fought any move to more federal power until his dying day July 4, 1826

    “My reading of history convinces me that most bad government results from too much government.” Thomas Jefferson

    A government big enough to give you everything you want, is big enough to take away everything you have. Thomas Jefferson

  8. Since the word “That” is capitalized, it would follow that it is the start of a new sentence after a period. English grammar rules would appear to clearly indicate that the dot is a period.

  9. I’m not understand the objections here because the only legitimate function of our government IS to protect individual rights. As Ayn Rand wrote:

    The only proper functions of a government are: the police, to protect you from criminals; the army, to protect you from foreign invaders; and the courts, to protect your property and contracts from breach or fraud by others, to settle disputes by rational rules, according to objective law.

  10. So what does this dimwit think the phrase- “instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed” -mean? Oh yeah, executive orders, right?

    This is reminiscent of the constant parsing of the 2nd amendment by the left, to try and change it’s original intent.

  11. Lemme git this straight … a marxist, historical-revisionist perfesser, from the same school where the serial lying, America-hating, socialist President, Woody Wilson presided, has found some obscure, only sensed by those blessed with sixth sense, error in our Declaration?

    I smell BULLSHIT!

  12. The genius should renounce her American citizenship and move to a leftist utopian hellhole like Cuba. Instead the brainiac wants everyone in United States stupid and miserable just like her.

  13. What is this, Period Week? The other day, we had a bunch of feminazis wearing blood-stained white pants. Today, the Punctuation Police are beating up on Thomas Jefferson, who shuffled off this mortal coil precisely 188 years ago today. (He died on the 50th anniversary of the signing of the declaration, as did that other fine patriot, John Adams.)

    Have a happy Independence Day, everyone!

  14. Danielle Allen is worried about a period? She needs to look again. What about all those effs translated as esses? “We hold these truths tobe—yes it’s one word!—felf-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 Happinefs.—— That to fecure these rights, Governments are … etc.

    They need to sprinkle lemon juice on that old parchment. I bet there’s some kind of secret code that will lead on a journey across the world—probably to the Louvre—where an archaic flying machine-like contraption will have a part that opens a gateway to a tunnel that lead to a cavern where some more clues lead on another trip across the world pant pant pant pant… until finally the real Crown-Jewels lost these 300 years—although nobody knew it!—will at last be found!

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