We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.
It is crucial to note two things in this portion of the Declaration: 1. Thomas Jefferson sourced our rights in our “Creator,” not in government or in a majority vote of the population. 2. Jefferson sourced government’s power in the people. In other words, governments possess powers, not rights, and the U.S. government only has power because the people lend it a portion of the authority that they possess by birth.
And the authority which the people lend government never communicates permission to infringe on the rights with which the people were endowed. (This is why James Madison used Federalist 46 to stress that “ultimate authority…resides in the people alone.”)
