Committee Of FiveEdit

The Committee of Five was a drafting panel convened by the Continental Congress in June 1776 to articulate a formal justification for the colonies' decision to break with Great Britain. The five members were Thomas Jefferson of Virginia, John Adams of Massachusetts, Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania, Roger Sherman of Connecticut, and Robert R. Livingston of New York. Though Livingston ultimately did not sign the final document, the committee’s work produced a compact, persuasive statement that framed a political revolution in terms of natural rights, governed by consent and the rule of law.

The choice of these five men reflected a balance of regional experience, legal training, and practical political leadership. Jefferson, the principal drafter, supplied the philosophical backbone, drawing on a tradition of republican thought that linked individual rights to a broader social contract. Adams, Franklin, Sherman, and Livingston provided diverse perspectives that helped refine the argument and make it respectable to a broad audience across the colonies. The process emerged from a growing consensus that independence was not merely a rebellion but a reconstitution of political legitimacy itself, rooted in universal principles rather than royal prerogatives.

The text produced by this committee—formally adopted by the Continental Congress as the formal explanation for independence—structured the new political project around timeless claims about human nature and governance. It linked the colonies’ grievances against Parliament to a larger argument about the rightful basis of government: that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, primarily to secure the protection of life, liberty, and property.

Origins and composition

The Continental Congress created the Committee of Five on June 11, 1776, to draft a declaration justifying independence to the world and to the American colonies themselves. Continental Congress is the body that authorized the panel and later considered and revised the draft.
The members—Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Roger Sherman, and Robert R. Livingston—brought together Southern, New England, Mid-Atlantic, and transactional political experience. Their regional and professional diversity helped the document speak to a growing, integrated political culture.
Livingston’s role was primarily as a contributing member who, for procedural reasons, did not sign the final version; the drafting responsibility devolved primarily to Jefferson, whose language would become the enduring symbol of the cause.

Drafting process and textual core

Thomas Jefferson wrote the first draft, drawing on natural-rights theory and a long-standing tradition of political philosophy about the purposes of government. The draft presented a concise case for independence, grounded in universal principles rather than mere opposition to particular British policies.
The Committee of Five submitted the draft to the Congress, which then engaged in debate and revision. The Congress preserved the core arguments about rights and government by consent, while adjusting language to reflect a broader political consensus.
The finished document linked the colonies’ grievances with a forward-looking declaration about the new political order, asserting that the colonies sought to cast off a system that no longer protected their rights and to establish a government built on secure, transferable principles.
The famous clauses—such as the assertion that people are endowed with certain unalienable rights and that governments are instituted to secure these rights—emerged from this process, giving the declaration its enduring moral and political authority.

Principles embedded in the declaration

Natural rights and the social contract: The text locates legitimacy in the consent of the governed and the protection of basic rights, rather than in lineage or royal prerogative. Natural rights and Social contract concepts provide the philosophical core.
Universal rights and civic obligation: The language speaks to a universal standard of liberty, while recognizing the practical realities of governance and political order within a new republic.
Limited government and accountability: By arguing that government exists to secure rights, the declaration implicitly supports restraints on political power and the possibility of political change when rulers violate that trust.
The appeal to reason and law over force: The document’s rhetoric is designed to persuade both domestic audiences and the broader world that independence rests on principled grounds, not mere rebellion.
References to equality and opportunity: The phrase commonly associated with the declaration—often summarized as “All men are created equal”—frames equality as a founding principle, even as the text’s own historical scope did not extend those rights to all groups in practice at the time. For context, see All men are created equal.

The text also places a premium on the rule of law and the idea that the legitimacy of a government rests on the protection of fundamental rights, which are not granted by rulers but acknowledged as inherent to human beings. See also the Declaration of Independence for the full document and related commentary.

Controversies and debates

Slavery and universal rights: One of the most persistent debates centers on the tension between the declaration’s universal rights rhetoric and the reality of slavery in the colonies. While the document claims equality and inalienable rights, enslaved people and many women did not enjoy the protections of those rights at the time. Critics note this inconsistency; defenders often argue that the declaration set a high normative standard that later generations would progressively realize through constitutional amendments and expanded civil rights. The discussion commonly referenced is tied to evolving interpretations of equality, liberty, and the responsibilities of a republic to extend rights over time. The related tensions with race and liberty are discussed in Abolitionism and Civil rights scholarship.
The scope of independence: Some contemporaries worried about the dangers of radical segregation from imperial governance. A more incremental, legally grounded approach—emphasizing the maintenance of public order, predictable law, and economic stability—was championed by those who valued gradual reform alongside principled independence. See also debates about the appropriate balance between liberty and order in early American political culture.
Woke criticisms and interpretive disputes: Critics from various perspectives argue about whether the declaration’s language should be interpreted as a universal liberation charter or as a boastful assertion that masked the social compromises of its era. From a traditional-read standpoint, the emphasis is on enduring principles of limited government and natural rights as the foundation of a durable republic, while acknowledging that the text reflected the era’s imperfect application of those ideas. The debate over the text’s universality versus historical circumstance continues in scholarly discussions of Founding Fathers and the evolution of constitutional liberty.

Aftermath and impact

The Declaration’s adoption as a public, political act helped unify disparate colonial factions under a common cause and provided a narrative for international diplomacy and alliance-building during the Revolution. It also established a moral vocabulary for constitutional government that would influence debates about rights, representation, and the rule of law in the new republic.
In practice, the founders drew on the Declaration’s principles to justify a governing framework that would later be elaborated in the United States Constitution and its Bill of Rights. The emphasis on limited government, accountability, and the protection of individual rights remained central to American political culture and constitutional development.
The text’s enduring influence can be seen in how it framed political legitimacy as grounded in universal rights and the consent of the governed, a standard that subsequent generations would defend and reinterpret through both reform and constitutional amendments. See for instance discussions surrounding Constitutionalism and Representative government.