The Lee Resolution formally declared the Thirteen Colonies independent before the Declaration was written.
Richard Henry Lee of Virginia introduced the resolution in the Second Continental Congress on June 7, 1776. Its central statement proposed that the colonies become “free and independent States,” ending their political connection with Great Britain.
Congress approved the independence resolution on July 2, 1776. A committee then prepared a fuller explanation of the decision, which became the Declaration of Independence. Thomas Jefferson drafted most of that document, while Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, Roger Sherman, and Robert Livingston served with him on the Committee of Five.
July 4 is the celebrated national holiday because Congress approved the Declaration’s final text that day. The Lee Resolution and the Declaration therefore mark related but distinct steps: one declared independence, while the other explained and justified it.