US Independence Day: The Declaration: Part 6

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:

For protecting them, by mock trial,
from punishment for any murders
which they should commit
on the inhabitants of these states:

For cutting off our trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing taxes on us without our consent:

For depriving us in many cases,
of the benefits of trial by jury:

For transporting us beyond seas
to be tried for pretended offenses:

For abolishing the free system of English laws
in a neighboring 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
in these colonies:

For taking away our charters,
abolishing our most valuable laws,
and altering fundamentally the forms of our governments:

For suspending our own legislatures,
and declaring themselves invested with power
to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.


John Phillip Sousa, Liberty Bell March