[Pharmboy]

Revisionist history ping to the list.

The RevWar/Colonial History/General Washington ping list

[wagglebee]

The Declaration of Independence makes clear that our rights are granted to us by GOD, not government and further emphasizes that governments ONLY ROLE is to protect the God-given rights of individuals.

[LS]

Actually, the whole point---as we show in "A Patriot's History of the United States"---of the phrase involving "instituted among men" came from the flawed Lockean concept that government was artificial. This was a popular view at the time, and one that rejected the Greek/Hebrew concept that government was natural among men. But the fact that Jefferson IMMEDIATELY followed it with a phrase about replacing a bad government with one that ensured the rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness suggests that even Jefferson was disavowing this element of Locke (correctly) and that even in 1776 he was challenging the notion that government was artificial.

With or without a comma, it's irrelevant as to the larger issue to which Jefferson wrote: rights are God-given, natural, and when government endangers them, it is the people's DUTY to replace that government with another.