Second Continental Congress
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The age of exploration, imperialism and colonialism may be said to have begun in the late 15th century, as European monarchs began to finance conquering seafarers in hopes of bringing faraway lands under their dominion. Christopher Columbus' mythical Atlantic crossing in 1492 marks the fabled beginning of this age from the North American perspective. As the very existence of the United States of America so adequately attests, the legacy of this era of imperialism and conquest ultimatelyùand perhaps not ironicallyùsubverted imperial rule and galvanized rebellion. By the time the Declaration of Independence was 100 years old, the US was experiencing the height of the Industrial Age and was fast becoming an economic powerhouse of global proportions. In reviewing the years spanning 1492 and 1876, many critical events stand out in sharp relief. The most important of these, however, surely is the Second Continental Congress, which convened on May 10, 1775. At the Second Continental Congress, the greatest modern political minds perhaps ever assembled came together and behaved as a political unit on behalf of liberty, democracy, and revolution. The effects of this meeting were lasting, and set in motion trends in political philosophy that persist to this day. Political concepts taken for granted in the modern Western World were hotly contested philosophical issues in the pre-Revolutionary American colonies. The Second Continental Congress embodied this debate; alienated
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endence. In short, allegiance to the Crown of England was severed by the Second Continental Congress, and the death of that decrepit union represented the birth of the mighty Union: American History had truly begun. The content of the Declaration introduced ancient political concepts in a modern way, and paired legitimate grievances against the king with assertions of independence and liberty on behalf of the new United States. It was an unabashed act of war that would change the world.
As an "Action of the Second Continental Congress, July 4, 1776" (Jefferson 9), the Declaration of Independence represented the seminal product of the pre-Revolutionary era. Providing justification for a bid for independence, Jefferson was doing more than simply "declare the causes which impel them [the People] to the Separation" (Jefferson 9). As explained by Forrest McDonald, American patriots were agreed that the proper ends of government "were to protect people in their lives, liberty and property", but that most importantly, "liberty was the most precious of these, for men were willing to sacrifice the other two for its preservation". The Declaration was therefore revolutionary philosophically as well as politically in its reliance upo
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Approximate Word count = 1937
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page)
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