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  The genesis of the Declaration of Independence, America’s most venerable instrument of democracy, is well known. With the New World colonists desiring to terminate their allegiance and political ties to Great Britain because of King George III’s repeated injustices, a committee was formed to express the resolution of Richard Henry Lee, the senior delegate from Virginia, that the united colonies become “free and independent states.” Between the 11th and 26th of June, 1776, Thomas Jefferson, a Virginia lawyer and statesman, drew up the bulk of the draft, to which committee members made only minor changes. On June 28, the committee presented its draft to the Continental Congress, which read it and debated Lee’s resolution, then added some words and deleted others before adopting the final draft. Jefferson was unsettled by the revisions made by the Congress, but the Declaration of Independence was essentially still his, and over the years his reputation as its primary author was rightfully handed down.

  Fame eluded George Mason, but the colonial statesman's Virginia Declaration of Rights was an important document of early American history.

  Shortly before Jefferson commenced writing his first draft, his fellow Virginian George Mason was carving out his own manifesto of liberty for his colony. Pursuant to the Continental Congress’s May 10, 1776, recommendation that the colonies “adopt such government as shall … conduce to the happiness and safety of their constituents,” the Virginia Convention convened and called for a committee to draft a bill of rights. A twenty-seven-man committee was formed, and Mason, a respected political thinker who for more than a decade previously had been writing about human rights, emerged as the chief architect. Mason began writing the first draft of his declaration around the 20th of May and completed it within a week. He produced in his own hand a set of articles that provided a bill of rights for the citizens of Virginia, reflecting the political goals of the convention. A number of clauses were tacked on by Thomas Ludwell Lee—a brother of Richard Henry Lee—in his hand, as well as by other committee members.

  On May 27 the committee draft was read to the Virginia Convention; then it was printed and distributed so it could be discussed. Beginning on May 29, over the next ten days or so delegates criticized and debated the wording and meaning of the articles. The delegates wrangled, sometimes acrimoniously, over propositions such as whether there should be “the fullest Toleration in the Exercise of Religion,” and whether the words “that all men are born equally free and independent” would lead to a rebellion by the slaves, but finally the debates came to an end, and on June 12 the final draft was ratified in Williamsburg. Meanwhile, newspapers in other colonies printed drafts of the Virginia Declaration of Rights, not only bringing it into wide circulation but enabling it to serve later as an exemplar for state constitution preambles. By the time Jefferson sat down to write his draft, Mason’s document was well known.

  Plagiarism is the taking of words and ideas of another writer and passing them off as one’s own without attribution. It is alleged to occur when the literary purloiner’s work is substantially similar to the earlier work, and when the alleged infringer had access to the original work. To determine plagiarism, lines from the original work and the allegedly copied work are compared. Similarity of words as well as ideas should be observed.

  Here follows a comparison of lines from the first publicized draft of George Mason’s Virginia Declaration of Rights and Thomas Jefferson’s “original Rough draught” of the Declaration of Independence:

  Mason: That all Men are born equally free and independent.

  Jefferson: That all men are created equal & independent.

  Mason: And have certain inherent natural Rights.

  Jefferson: That from that equal creation they derive rights inherent & inalienable.

  Mason: Among which are the Enjoyment of Life and Liberty, with the Means of acquiring and possessing Property, and pursuing and obtaining Happiness …

  Jefferson: Among which are the preservation of life, & liberty, & the pursuit of Happiness.

  Mason: That power is, by God and Nature, vested in, and consequently derived from the People. … That Government is, or ought to be, instituted for the common Benefit and Security of the People, Nation, or Community.

  Jefferson: That to secure these ends, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.

  Mason: That whenever any Government shall be found inadequate, or contrary to these Purposes, a Majority of the Community had an indubitable, inalienable and indefensible Right to reform, alter or abolish it.

  Jefferson: That whenever any form of government shall become destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it.

  Mason: Of all the various Modes and Forms of Government, that is best, which is capable of producing the greatest Degree of Happiness and Safety.

  Jefferson: To institute new government, laying it’s foundation on such principles & organising it’s powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety & happiness.

  It is clear from the above examples that some of the words, phraseology, and thoughts in Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence are strikingly similar to those in George Mason’s Virginia Declaration of Rights. The line-by-line comparison reveals an expression of the same ideas. Jefferson uses similar phraseology, and while there is no verbatim reproduction of words, there is often replication of key words.

  Mason’s “certain inherent natural Rights” is a key point in his manifesto, which was essentially duplicated by Jefferson in his. Another vital point is Mason’s “Among which are the Enjoyment of Life and Liberty, with the Means of … pursuing and obtaining Happiness.” Jefferson echoes this point, with his “Among which are the preservation of life, & liberty, & the pursuit of Happiness.” Jefferson’s duplication of Mason in these and other instances is obvious, but to his credit it can be said that he expressed the same sentiments more succinctly, if not more lyrically.

  But of the total number of words and ideas in each document, how much duplication is there? Mason’s first draft consists of sixteen paragraphs (including articles written by others), each a sentence or two long. The body of the text of Jefferson’s original document begins with two expository paragraphs, then follows with more than two dozen articles listing the colonists’ grievances against the king of Great Britain, and concludes with a few expository paragraphs.

  Pages two and three of the Virginia Declaration of Rights. Page two is faded and difficult to read.

  It is the second paragraph of Thomas Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence that seems to infringe on Mason, specifically his first three propositions. Jefferson’s Declaration begins with the well-known phrase, “When in the course of human events …” The phrase commences a long, eloquent sentence, and its language and ideas are not contained in Mason’s thesis. The second paragraph begins with “We hold these truths to be self-evident.” This phrase isn’t contained in Mason’s document either, but the similarities begin immediately after it, with Jefferson’s “That all men are created equal & independent.” And it is here that there is similarity not only in words and thoughts, but in thought patterns and the sequence of thoughts.

  It is this last element that casts the most suspicion on Jefferson. That manifestos of liberty would share ideas is not unreasonable or unusual, even if there is a commonality of words; after all, there may be only a limited number of ways to express a particular idea. But a document that duplicates the thought pattern and sequence of thoughts of another, especially when it contains much the same language, strains credibility as to the subsequent writer’s originality.

  It may be said that the similarities, as substantial as they are, are limited to a handful of sentences. Indeed, there is ample difference in the ideas and language in the remainder of the two documents, which is to be expected since they each address a different, albeit related, purpose, as their titles state: one a bill of rights for citizens (as a basis for establishing the pri
nciples of government), the other a declaration of independence or dissolution of political connections (as a basis for rebellion). The remainder of Jefferson’s document is a list of the colonists’ grievances against the king of Great Britain. But even here there is some commonality of ideas. Mason proclaims, “Man hath a right … to a speedy Tryal by a Jury,” while Jefferson rebukes the king “for depriving us, in many cases, of the benefits of trial by jury.”

  A case can easily be made that there would be a natural overlap of ideas, given the similarity of the theses, but in the end it can be asserted that some of the most famous principles of Jefferson’s Declaration include to a large degree thoughts and words that resemble Mason’s. “That all men are created equal” is perhaps the most memorable point of Jefferson’s Declaration, and it imparts virtually the identical thought (not to mention some of the same words) as Mason’s “That all Men are born equally free and independent.” A comparison of the two documents indeed shows the apparent influence of the Mason document on Jefferson.

  But did Jefferson deliberately plagiarize from Mason? That is a very difficult call to make and, given the stature of Jefferson in American history, not an accusation one would make lightly.

  It is highly improbable that Jefferson was not aware of Mason’s document. The two men were political representatives from the same state, they were friends, and they traveled in the same political circles. It is possible that Mason had given a copy of his Declaration to Jefferson, but even if he hadn’t, Mason’s Virginia Declaration was published between June 6 and 12 in three newspapers in Philadelphia, the same city in which Jefferson resided while writing his Declaration. How could Jefferson not have been familiar with Mason’s document?

  While the Declaration of Independence may in part be based on the Virginia Declaration of Rights, Mason’s doctrine itself has literary antecedents dating back to the Middle Ages and extending through the eighteenth-century philosophical movement known as the Enlightenment. Indeed, the long and noble line of charters of freedom, many derived in part from their antecedents, are like members of a family chain who have received genetic material from their ancestors. Among the illustrious members of this “family” of freedom documents is the 1215 Magna Carta, the 1689 English Bill of Rights, and John Locke’s 1690 Second Treatise of Government.

  The Second Treatise contains phrases that may be recognized in Mason’s and Jefferson’s declarations, for example: “life, liberty and estate,” “free, equal and independent,” and “all men, however born, are free.” But these and other similar Lockeian phrases are used in essentially different contexts. Mason and Jefferson embrace many of the same ideas set forth by Locke, but it is doubtful that a strong case could be made that they plagiarized him. Still, the influence of Locke is apparent.

  The doctrine of natural rights sets forth that human beings are equal and free by nature and have many natural rights including the right to act of their own free will, the right not to be subordinated to political control without their permission, and the right to be secure from injury by others in their lives, liberty, and property. Locke masterfully set forth natural rights theories, but the doctrine was also effectively expounded by other philosophers, such as Thomas Hobbes and Samuel Pufendorf. Locke embraced other political tenets in such works as his Essay on Toleration, whose lengthy thesis was concisely taken up by Mason, who proclaimed in his Virginia Declaration “that all Men shou’d enjoy the fullest Toleration in the Exercise of Religion … unpunished and unrestrained by the Magistrate. …”

  There are undoubtedly various examples of ideas and words written by Mason that were set down by others before him. And like Mason, who may have borrowed from those who preceded him, Jefferson wasn’t the only one to take such a literary cue. James Madison dipped into the literary and philosophical riches of Mason’s Virginia Declaration in formulating the U.S. Bill of Rights, the U.S. Constitution’s first ten amendments. The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, France’s constitutional preamble issued in 1789 by the National Assembly, embodied many of the same precepts as the Declaration of Independence, including that citizens have certain sacred rights, that “men are born and remain free and equal,” that humans have the inalienable rights of “liberty, property, security, and resistance to oppression,” and that “every man is presumed innocent until he has been declared guilty.” That France’s declaration should closely mirror America’s was no surprise, since it was drafted by the Marquis de Lafayette after visiting America, where he passionately embraced the U.S. doctrine. (Ironically, the demand for a constitution from the French monarchy, which led to limited powers for the king and eventually to Louis XVI’s beheading, grew partially out of the debts incurred by France in assisting American citizens win independence from England.)

  Both Mason and Jefferson received input from their peers on their preliminary and final drafts. But each document became the child of its chief architect. Still, Jefferson himself disavowed claims to originality in his declaration. In a letter to Henry Lee dated May 8, 1825, from his home at Monticello, Jefferson took up the intent of the Declaration of Independence. Recalling the days a half century earlier when the British government had contravened the Americans’ rights and the colonists were forced to wage war to cast off the despotic English government, he wrote that “an appeal to the tribunal of the world was proper for our justification. This was the object of the Declaration of Independence.” Indeed, the Declaration of Independence was printed in a variety of publications and in this way disseminated to the world.

  According to Jefferson, the declaration was not intended to set forth fresh doctrines of a united people under the oppressive tentacles of a foreign power, but to express to the world a people’s mutual pledge to levy war to protect their lives and honor. “Not to find out new principles, or new arguments, never before thought of, not merely to say things which had never been said before,” Jefferson wrote, “but to place before mankind the common sense of the subject, in terms so plain and firm as to command their assent, and to justify ourselves in the independent stand we are compelled to take.”

  Jefferson continued, delineating how the document was to be the product of American thinking: “Neither aiming at originality of principle or sentiment, nor yet copied from any particular and previous writing, it was intended to be an expression of the American mind, and to give to that expression the proper tone and spirit called for by the occasion. All its authority rests then on the harmonizing sentiments of the day, whether expressed in conversation, in letters, printed essays, or in the elementary books of public right, as Aristotle, Cicero, Locke, Sidney, &c.”

  In January 1777, broadsides of the Declaration of Independence were printed and distributed. It was on these copies that citizens first saw the names of the signers, which until then had not been publicly revealed. At the end of the month John Hancock, the Continental Congress’s president and the declaration’s first signer, distributed the broadsides with a letter in which he wrote:

  As there is not a more distinguished Event in the History of America, than the Declaration of her Independence—nor any, that, in all probability, will so much excite the Attention of future Ages, it is highly proper, that the Memory of that Transaction, together with the Causes that gave Rise to it, should be preserved in the most careful Manner that can be devised.

  That may be true, but history would be remiss in not honoring a beacon of freedom, one whose literary flourishes were grafted onto the more celebrated document whose legacy remains the quintessence of manifestos championing the right of individuals to be free from political tyranny. Indeed, in the interests of scholarship, the historical record, and propriety, future generations would do well to heed the debt owed by the Declaration of Independence and its framers, chiefly Thomas Jefferson, to George Mason and his noble charter of freedom, the Virginia Declaration of Rights.

  LOCATION: Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.

  THE RISING SUN CHAIR

  DAT
E: 1787.

  WHAT IT IS: The chair on which presiding officer George Washington sat during the Constitutional Convention, whose fame was further enlarged by a propitious remark made about it by one of the convention’s most esteemed delegates.

  WHAT IT LOOKS LIKE: It is a mahogany Philadelphia Chippendale armchair with a high back and partially covered armrests that measures 60³/₁₆ inches from top to bottom, 29¹¹/₁₆ inches at its greatest width, and 22¹⁵/₁₆ inches at its greatest depth. Its seat is covered in red morocco leather (which traditionally was dried goatskin). The chair’s open-worked splat is composed of vertical and horizontal rails on which are engraved designs of wheat and cornucopiae. At the top of the splat is a horizontal crest rail whose center area forms an artistic elevated shape. In the center of this shape is a gold-painted carving of a half sun with carved facial features of eyes, eyebrows, and a nose that is surrounded by a semicircular pattern of carved lines denoting sun rays. Standing on the center ray is a carved pole on which rests a Liberty cap that resembles an umbrella.

  It was merely an artistic carving on a mundane object, but the ups and downs of the political convention in which the object played a role seemed to be reflected in the ambiguous design, as observed by one of the convention’s most prominent participants. In its metaphorical essence, ultimately the design—like the convention itself—auspiciously reflected the destiny of a nation.