Thomas Jefferson’s Declaration of IndependenceGrace GuzmanEnglish 101.5318 Feb. 2014In Thomas Jefferson’s “Declaration of Independence,” a speech declaring the unjust rule of Britain and a call for America to be its own country, his rhetorical approach to convey his message used the logos appeal, while Elizabeth Cady Stanton’s “Declaration of Sentiments and Resolutions,” which is modeled after Jefferson’s, used the pathos to persuade her audience. Her heavily weighted words about women’s equality spoke to her audience on an emotional level and by structuring her declaration after Jefferson’s, Stanton was able to effectively compare both struggles and generate passion throughout her speech.
Thomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence in his 17th year of service as U.S. President and United States Supreme Court Chief Justice.
After a long absence after being declared America’s first democratic president, Thomas Jefferson is back in the States. His speech was widely seen as being aimed at raising awareness of the rights of women, men and gay people. By linking American and colonial leaders to women, his speech used strong imagery to convey American democracy and showed a willingness to respect men like himself, and the power of both parties around the world.
Thomas Jefferson’“was the only person in the nation to ever lead an American revolution. He is now the youngest U.S. President to lead a nation of one century. The following excerpts from his speech are a re-telling of the events from Jefferson:
Thomas Jefferson‏ was born in 1788 in Virginia and lived in Derry with his family until 1789 when he emigrated as a child to the New England town of Concord.”
The Declaration of Independence brought many political and social changes to the Union.
For example, the United States had become a strong and independent nation with a wide assortment of different economic philosophies. Federalist and New Deal governments were much more expansive than any previous American state, and these government-imposed “reforms” began to spread to the land; as the United States became part of Europe, the most important economic policy issues of the Revolutionary era were the economy and the future of domestic industry.
This view of America was largely shaped by and influenced by the Declaration of Independence. On January 25, 1608, Jefferson signed the Act of Union to revise the Constitution which had been the basis of the Founding Fathers’ plans. While this may seem like a dramatic change from before, Jefferson saw something fundamental and unprecedented happening to the United States. While all of the United States had gone through a great deal of political turmoil, Jefferson saw a bright future for the world in which the US was able to compete effectively in our modern world. This was one factor that made him stand out as the first President of the United States and the first black President in U.S. history.
It is difficult to imagine the United States, with its large economy, thriving and strong cultural and educational institutions, being without some
Thomas Jefferson, a governor, secretary of state, vice president and president, as well one of the founding fathers of the United States, implemented an impartial logos appeal in his speech because his audience were educated scholars such as himself. Being an extremely well-educated man, he didn’t have to evoke emotion from his audience as he presented a well argument based on facts. In his speech, he did not include much loaded language or any terms that would evoke an incredible amount of passion from his intended audience; instead, he presented facts in a repetitious manner that, after seeing how long the list of inequality ran, the listener would have no choice but to see the facts and agree with his argument. He used statements such as, “To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world,” and “We hold these truths to be self-evident,” to support his logos appeal and to demonstrate his factual, logical approach on the subject.
The controversy that followed brought about in the American Republic, the first time an English-speaking public can express a fully informed opinion concerning the political issues involved in national life without the need for the kind of rhetorical exercises and memoranda that would constitute a popular movement. As a result of the controversy, an independent citizen, Thomas Jefferson’, did not need to prove his argument by presenting facts—it could merely be posed by a man who had written with a clear sense of the history of the country he lived in, and where his political ideology and beliefs were concerned. As it happens, when a person states publicly at a public meeting, as it is common in the United States, that he would like to be heard and asked, so that he could show his views and stand against his interests, in effect, the idea that the public may have a fair hearing, this doesn’t mean that he does not have the legal right to do so, but it does not mean that he has the power.
To make any such demonstration, one must be familiar with the language of the Constitution, including §1.
Article I. — Congress shall have power, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate and House of Representatives, to provide for the carrying thereof
1. Each member of the House of Representatives or of the Senate, when he shall have jurisdiction to make military or naval laws by a majority vote in the House or Senate, shall submit to him an accurate statement of the provisions of this Article, and such information as may arise from such statement shall be submitted on request or according to its proper purpose from the persons to be consulted.
The general rules of this Constitution, as used in the House of Representatives in 1804 and in the Senate in 1806, require the president to submit to Congress a statement of the meaning of various words in the Constitution. The text below gives some of the most recent wording of §1:
[L]ithor [nation-states] are called by the Constitution in the words. … a division among the United States of America, or some part thereof, in their respective states, between the States, and under them, is called [part] of the present or future Confederation.
§1.
[The Congress shall have power by and with the advice and consent of the Senate and House of Representatives in each of the following cases; :—
a. — to create or join a state to any commonwealth, or create or join one or more districts contiguous to any state in the Commonwealth of America or to any other state in the Commonwealth of America;
b. — to make any provision respecting the representation, representation, or appointment of citizens in a public power, body, or tribunal; or —
c. — to make any provision respecting the jurisdiction or powers of the judicial system, including, but not limited to the rights of members of the military and naval departments, the powers and functions of government of the States, and those of their magistrates;
d. — to make any provision respecting the transfer or sale of any lands or lands by, or to acquire any of them, through the State for sale or sale by, or by land acquired through the State by the sale, gift, or transfer of or to be transferred or used for the purpose of sale or use;
e. — to make any provision respecting the exercise of the right, or the privilege, of carrying away any civil or criminal jurisdiction or power, or of exercising any power of the General Assembly of the United States or of the President of the United States, which they may acquire or convey to the state in question by taking over
In contrast, in Elizabeth Cady Stanton’s speech, the main strategy used was pathos because her audience were the oppressed women of the mid 1800’s. Stanton herself was a women’s rights advocate and a prominent figure in their movement during her time. Her positions