All Men Equal?

Paper Summary:

The paper discusses how leaders like Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin are celebrated for their efforts in creating the Declaration of Independence and shaping our ideas about government. The paper reveals, however, that Franklin and Jefferson were both slave holders despite their promotion of democratic ideals. The paper points out seemingly hypocritical statements present in the Declaration and concludes that certain parts of the Declaration could benefit from being clarified and improved.

From the Paper:

"A century after the Declaration of Independence, the United States Supreme Court had to interpret the words of the Declaration, in a lawsuit brought by Dred Scott (Burnside, 2005). Scott was a slave who had lived 13 years in a non-slave state. He sued for a declaration that he was a free citizen of the United States. The Court held, by a 7:2 majority, that the words "all men are created equal" did not apply to African Americans. The language of the judgment is a blatant display of the hypocrisy of the Declaration (Bunrside, 2005)."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Cherniss, Joshua. (Spring, 1998). Tis Time To Part: Renovating the Wall of Separation Between Church & State. The Yale Journal of Ethics.
• Burnside, Julian. (2005). Hypocrisy and Human Rights. Spare Rooms For Refugees. Retrieved from the Internet at: http://www.spareroomsforrefugees.com/main.htm.
• Goldthwaite, John. (December 17, 1996). Rebuttal Rights Memorandum. Fort Drum, New York: Department of the Army.
• NIAHD. (November 5, 2005). Hypocrisy in the Declaration of Independence. NIAHD Journals.

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