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All Men Were Created Equal Dbq Analysis

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America is the land of the free and home of the brave, but has it always been? If someone were to reference old documents like The Declaration of Independence or even The Constitution they would think so, but American history itself says otherwise. During the mid 1770’s slavery was an almost unquestioned normality and women had no rights, however when The Declaration of Independence was written, the statement, “all men are created equal” appeared while Thomas Jefferson stated the natural rights of every human. This statement is clearly not true in the eyes of the men who wrote and edited this document, hence proving that the statement “all men were created equal” is hypocritical. In accordance to primary sources gained from this period of intolerance and recreations of it, it is clear that not only were the women not treated as equal, but the African men and women treated as property were also stripped of the three main rights and liberties the Declaration argues for. …show more content…

Abigail Adams letter to John Adams asking him to remember the ladies when the new country is made (Source B), and his crude letter back explaining her ridiculousness (Source E). A letter most likely written by a free slave so desperate for the freedom of the African children that he learned to write and sends a petition to the congress (Source C). And finally, in the recreation of the the mid 1770’s events, the miniseries John Adams (Source D). Therefore, The statement, “All men were created equal” is a hypocritical statement because the African people and women were treated as property to be owned instead of as equal people as the statement

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In the letter written by Benjamin Banneker to George Washington and Thomas Jefferson in 1791 uses many rhetorical strategies like metaphor and an allusion to the bible from the Declaration of Independence to convey his thoughts that slavery is the root against ideas that all men are created equal. Banneker uses a respectful tone throughout his letter to get to his point in a educated manner. Banneker uses human aid metaphorically when he says “...which every human aid appeared unavailable,...” . He compares help to human aid when he says that human aid is not available as saying help is not found in any surroundings. He purposely gives us that metaphor so we as a reader will understand what was happening in the 18th century with the issue

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70 Words | 1 Pages

Thomas Jefferson, one of America’s founding fathers and key contributing author of the 1776 Declaration of Independence, is responsibility for pinning the documents powerful and well known line, “all Men are created equal”. The concept that “all Men are created equal” is the foundation of America’s phiolosy. “Yet, it was written at a time when some inhabitants were held in bondage and other were being disposed of their lands” (Video).

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907 Words | 4 Pages

In the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson wrote, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” Although Jefferson claimed all men are endowed with liberty, he himself owned slaves his entire life. Jefferson also mentions men, which was not meant in the general all-of-mankind sense, but rather that only wealthy white men are entitled to these rights. Abigail Adams, John Adams’ wife, realized the lack of power women had and tried to point it out to her husband, yet he wrote back, “As to your extraordinary code of laws, I cannot but laugh.” John Adams then went on to write about how he will make sure the men do not abuse their power.

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760 Words | 4 Pages

The idea of all men are created equal is specious because there were Slavery, and women did not have equal rights as men. Sources A, B, C, D, show how the statement “all men are created equal” is hypocritical. The Declaration of Independence, from Source A, provides the reader that the Declaration of Natural Rights is false. In Source B, the letter from Abigail Adams shows how men had “unlimited power,” and women did not have the ability to vote, own property, or speak out in Congress. In Source C, it conveys how Slavery provoked unfair rights, embittered lives, and the loss of natural rights.

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266 Words | 2 Pages

Another factor that presents injustices, inequality and prejudices the article From Notes on Virginia (1779), Jefferson address political leaders and argues not to free the slaves. At the same time giving reasons with giving an adverse distinction on the appearance of African Americans, Later stating that Black Americans is not intelligence and that they smell. In fact, Jefferson offers the belief that Black Americans were inferior to Whites and by making these statements pronounce of being ethically wrong that produce inequity. Granted there was various individual like George Fitzhugh a southerner indicated that the document referring to the Declaration of Independence meant all men created equal as it relates to equal possession of property.

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377 Words | 2 Pages

I believe Thomas Jefferson meant when he said,”all men are created equal” mean everyone race,size,color,or religion should have he/she freedom or own life. In 1776 Thomas Jefferson made a statement about abolition ment of slavery to restore freedom to the slaves. But this nevered happened,so none of the plantation released or freed slaves. Even though the slavery wasn’t

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1006 Words | 5 Pages

“Human rights are not a privilege granted by the few, they are a liberty entitled to all, and human rights, by definition, include the rights of all humans, those in the dawn of life, the dusk of life, or the shadows of life”a quote by Kay Granger. In the 1830’s America lacked human rights for people of color and woman. Woman were not allowed to own any property or even a paycheck. African Americans were oppressed and segregated into slavery. Later on, Native Americans also began to be segregated and oppressed by Americans Elizabeth Stanton's document “Declaration of Sentiments”, Frederick Douglass’ speech “What to a Slave is the Fourth of July”, and Cherokee Phoenix newspaper article to the Cherokee, people all use strong rhetorical appeals

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812 Words | 4 Pages

While the Declaration of Independence expressed the ideas of equality and liberty this did not mean that every group in America received the same benefits from the promise of the Revolution. Looking at the situation after the Revolution, Richard Morris comments: "Everywhere one finds inequality." He finds "the people" of "We the people of the United States" (a phrase coined by the very rich Gouverneur Morris) did not mean Indians or blacks or women or white servants (Zinn). The Indians were excluded from equality and liberty in America because they were saw as "savages" by the Americans. The slaves in the South were excluded from the blessings of liberty too since they were owned by their masters and had no freedom.

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737 Words | 3 Pages

Rosa Park once said, “ Racism is still with us. But it is up to us to prepare our children for what they have to meet, and hopefully, we should overcome.” This illustrates how racism still exist but, it is up to the people to prepare their children to not become how society used to be. From 1619 to the 1960’s, women and African American people did not have the same rights as men or as white people did. Women were not able to make their own decisions and African American were slaves.

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Even today in our society we still follow The Declaration of Independence. The quote "All men are created equally" for us mean that, All U.S citizen are the same, we have have the same equal rights and no one is differently when it comes to laws. In the novelette equality

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832 Words | 4 Pages

The ideas of natural rights and all men are created equal only applied to white men and not anyone else. Women of all colors, and colored men were not included when writing about their natural born rights. In contrast, I believe the idea of having the right to overthrow a tyrannical government was already in motion when this document was being written. After all, this was how the United States was founded, going to war with a tyrant king that was abusing his power and not acting in the best interest of his citizens. Moreover, the right of the government being run by the citizens was also happening when this document was published.

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603 Words | 3 Pages

Some feel that our courts are safe and true, others would say our courts have various flaws and don’t always fulfill the truth. In Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird, Atticus Finch is the father to two young children, Scout and Jem, and works as a lawyer as a single father in their small southern town in Alabama during the thirties. Atticus gets handed a case when he has to defend a black man over a white woman. Through the use of racism and symbolism, Atticus’s claim that “out courts are the great levelers, and in our court’s all men are created equal,” is proved to be unsuitable.

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798 Words | 4 Pages

"One day this nation will rise up, live out the true meaning of its creed...that all men are created equal." The man — Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. — spoke to a crowd of 250,000 black and white Americans. They shared his vision of evenness. They had gone to Washington, D.C., to listen this letter The year was 1963(http://www.scholastic.com).

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981 Words | 4 Pages

The words of Thomas Jefferson from the Declaration of Independence marked the beginning of a nation, and the birth of the United States of America. The basis of the Declaration was based on the idea of freedom, where “all men are created equal.” However, by today’s standards, the Declaration of Independence has many controversial points. One of them concerns the topic over slavery, where there have been many disagreements between the current interpretations and the views of our founding fathers hundreds of years ago. Many have argued that hypocrisy evidently exists in the words written in the Declaration.

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496 Words | 2 Pages

On July 4, 1776, the representatives of thirteen American colonies got together and sign the Declaration of Independence; it indicated the independence of a brand new country: the United States. It is said in the document that “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” (15). Life, Liberty and pursuit for happiness was the right that given to all Americans. However, during that period of time, neither women nor colored people enjoyed the right that they should have. According the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database, “between 1525 and 1866, 12.5 million Africans were shipped to

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