The five-member committee that drafted the Declaration of Independence was called the Committee of Five. The Second Continental Congress appointed it on June 11, 1776, while preparing to explain the colonies’ case for independence.
Its members were John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, Robert R. Livingston, and Roger Sherman. Congress selected Jefferson to write the first draft, after Adams helped persuade the group that Jefferson was the best choice for the task.
Jefferson largely composed the draft between June 11 and June 28. The other committee members reviewed it, and Congress later edited the wording before adopting the Declaration on July 4, 1776.
The Committee of Five should not be confused with the broader Second Continental Congress, which debated and approved the document. Nor was it the Committee of Thirteen, another congressional group associated with early proposals for a union. The committee’s work is a key part of the founding story highlighted by America’s 250th anniversary.