Based rather closely on a well-known document of remarkable contemporary relevance, in time for the July 4 holiday.

A declaration of free-thinking citizens of the Earth against American Empire:

When in the course of human events it becomes necessary for people to dissolve the political bands that have connected them with a national government, and to assume among the powers of the Earth the autonomy to which the laws of Nature entitle them as human beings and human communities, a decent respect for world opinion requires an explanation of why such separation is necessary.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all people on Earth are created equal and possess certain inalienable rights, including life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are created among people, deriving their just powers from the consent of these same people, in cooperation with the people of other nations of the Earth. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter, abolish, or abstain from it, and to institute new government, based on such principles and in such form as will best promote their safety and happiness.

Declarations of independence should not be taken lightly, but when a long train of abuses and usurpations subjects people to absolute despotism, it is their right, even their duty, individually and collectively, to throw off such government and to create new forms of free association, cooperation, and governance.

The history of the present King George II, ruling over an ever-expanding American Empire, is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, tyrannizing the people and various states of America, as well as other nations, peoples, and creatures of the Earth. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused to obey international law or bodies of international cooperation designed to promote the greater good worldwide.

He has sowed fear among the populace and used this climate of fear to abrogate many of the rights enumerated in America's Bill of Rights.

He has unlawfully detained many people, depriving them of due process and the benefits of trial by jury or legal counsel.

He has kept secret from the public many of the operations of government, making a mockery of governmental accountability to the people.

He has deprived the poor and needy of essential services in order to bring more wealth to the wealthiest and to fund a military force of unprecedented size, power, and terror.

He has lied repeatedly to the people of this nation and the world to justify unleashing military aggression upon weaker nations, illegally killing innocent civilians, deposing governments, and appropriating foreign resources, in order to expand the power and reach of American Empire in a show of cruelty and perfidy totally unworthy of the head of a civilized nation.

He has sought to further concentrate the control of media, upon which any genuine democracy depends, into ever fewer hands, placing private profit over public good.

He has dismantled protections of endangered creatures of the Earth, the places where they dwell, and indeed, the very air, water, and soil that constitute the Earth itself, again in the interest of private profit for a few.

He has transgressed international treaties designed to protect the Earth and its inhabitants, to administer justice internationally, and to keep the world safe from needless proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.

He has instituted a government of wealthy capitalists, by wealthy capitalists, and for wealthy capitalists, to the ruin of all else.

He never won the election in the first place.

In every stage of these oppressions we have protested, lobbied, and petitioned for redress, only to be answered by repeated injury. This is the mark of a tyrant unfit to govern a free people.

We therefore, individually and collectively as free and sovereign citizens of the Earth, declare our independence from American Empire, renouncing all allegiance to unjust laws and habits of this Empire, and assert our right and power to protect ourselves from imperial depredations while we endeavor to expose the true nature of American Empire, dismantle it, and put in its place a peaceful, just, sustainable, and democratic republic of free citizens. And in support of this declaration, we mutually pledge our lives, our actions, and our sacred honor.

Signed, Lansing Scott and all others who agree with this declaration

Resources: (the original) www.usconstitution.net/declar.html (other revised versions) sunsite.berkeley.edu/Goldman/Writings/Essays/independence.html production.teratech.com/usob/declare.cfm www.kentlaw.edu/ilhs/doc29.html