Declaration of Independence

While reading the Declaration of Independence I realized how serious Jefferson was about this new country and I saw through is eyes how he pictures this nation. He tells you throughout the declaration the hard times the people in America had gone through. He completely bashed the King for what he had done to the people and made the colonists sound very innocent. It was sort of like he was "pointing fingers" at the king saying that all their problems had come from him and all the colonists were innocent. I would consider that to be the "plain folks" propaganda technique. A great section of the declaration is about what the king had done. Jefferson was using true facts so nobody could argue or disagree with the declaration. It said,

"He has refused his assent to laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good. He has forbidden his governors to pass laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his assent should be obtained; when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of representation in the legislature, a right inestimable to them, into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved representative houses repeatedly, for opposing, with manly firmness, his invasions on the rights of the people" (Jefferson 122-123)

Paragraphs like the following continued on for several more paragraphs. Jefferson continued to insult the king. Jefferson was using the name calling approach. He was trying to convince the people who were not against the king to be against him. Jefferson stated a lot of the bad things he did to the colonists and it is pretty obvious he didn't care what happened to the king's reputation.

At times Jefferson kind of over exaggerated somethings the king did so you knew it did not really happen. Such as this statement, "He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burned our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people" (Jefferson 124). Now people know he did not actually plunder the seas and burned their towns. He was over exaggerating. This could be a bad thing if you think about it. If he over exaggerated one thing, then, how do the people know the whole thing was not over exaggerated? It may be confusing on what really happened and what didn't. People may have thought that the whole thing was an opinion rather than fact. I don't think he did this intentionally but I could see it happening. This could be considered an error of faulty logic. In our own Declaration of Independence there is an error? It is weird to think about.

Overall I think the Declaration is a very strongly worded document and makes good points so people can really understand what the country was like at that time. It makes you feel sorry for the colonists and dislike the king. I think that is probably what Jefferson wanted out of the declaration but I guess it's hard to tell.

Jefferson, Thomas. "Declaration of Independence" Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009. 122-124. Print.