Thomas Jefferson was the principal drafter of the Declaration of Independence, the founding document highlighted by America250.
In June 1776, the Second Continental Congress appointed a Committee of Five to prepare a declaration explaining the colonies’ decision to separate from Britain. The committee included Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Roger Sherman, and Robert Livingston. Jefferson wrote the initial draft, drawing on Enlightenment ideas and colonial political traditions.
The committee and Congress revised the document before its adoption. Jefferson was only 33 years old at the time, and his language about equality, natural rights, and government by consent became especially influential in later American political thought.
Jefferson was not the sole author of the final text, and he did not write it completely without assistance. Congress removed or altered passages, including a section criticizing the transatlantic slave trade. America250’s focus on 1776 includes both the declaration’s ideals and the complex historical setting in which they were written.