Thomas Jefferson drafted the main text of the Declaration of Independence, whose 250th anniversary America250 marks.
The Second Continental Congress appointed a five-member drafting committee consisting of Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Roger Sherman, and Robert R. Livingston. The committee asked Jefferson to prepare the initial draft, and Congress later revised the text before adopting it.
Jefferson was 33 years old in 1776 and represented Virginia in Congress. His draft included the influential statement that all men are created equal and that governments derive their powers from the consent of the governed. Congress removed or changed several passages during its revisions.
Jefferson did not write the Declaration entirely alone in the sense of producing its final form without review. Franklin and Adams offered suggestions, and the full Congress edited the draft. Still, Jefferson is correctly identified as its principal author and drafter.