On what date was the Declaration of the Rights of Man adopted?

The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen was adopted on 26 August 1789. The National Constituent Assembly approved this landmark statement of liberty, equality before the law and popular sovereignty during the early French Revolution.

The declaration grew out of Enlightenment ideas about natural rights and government by consent. Marquis de Lafayette prepared an influential early draft, while Abbé Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès, Honoré Mirabeau and other deputies shaped the text during intense debates in August. Its 17 articles asserted that people are born free and equal in rights, that law expresses the general will, and that authority ultimately comes from the nation.

The document was a declaration of principles rather than a complete constitution. It influenced the Constitution of 1791 and later French constitutional traditions, and its ideas resonated far beyond France. However, its language was not applied equally in practice: women, enslaved people and many colonial subjects were excluded from its political vision. Olympe de Gouges later challenged this omission in her 1791 Declaration of the Rights of Woman and of the Female Citizen.