American independence from Great Britain was declared by means of a broadside printed by John Dunlap, an Irish immigrant,
on the night of July 4, 1776, by vote of the Continental Congress immediately following its vote to approve the text of the
Declaration. Copies were delivered to John Hancock, then President of the Congress, in the morning of July 5th, and sent by
him to the state governors that day and on the 6th. Among these were the copies read by Colonel John Nixon from a platform in
the yard behind the Pennsylvania statehouse on July 8th, and by George Washington to his troops in New York on July 9th.
Vice-Admiral Richard Howe intercepted a copy and dispatched it to London on July 28th.
A copy was also preserved by the Secretary of the Congress, Charles Thompson, in his minutes book; and it was to this text
that a scribe, commissioned by the Congress, turned when preparing the ceremonial manuscript copy of the Declaration on
parchment, preserved at the National Archives in Washington, D.C., which was signed by members of the Continental Congress
on August 2, 1776. The printed Declaration of Independence thus predates the famous copy, signed by John Hancock et al., by
nearly a month. The printed copy bears only the names, in type, of Hancock and Thompson on behalf of the Congress, and of
the printer John Dunlap; it was the promulgation of an act of Congress and needed no more. The text of the ceremonial copy
differs from that of the printed original only in its title: it became a "Unanimous Declaration" only later in July 1776, when New
York State's members of Congress changed their vote from abstention to the affirmative.
It is interesting to note, when considering the Declaration of Independence, the often-cited "intent of the Founding Fathers", and
the high prices manuscripts by those who signed the ceremonial copy command in the marketplace, that some delegations to
the Continental Congress changed between July 4 and August 2, 1776. Therefore some who voted to approve the Declaration
of Independence had retired from Congress before the ceremonial copy was prepared, and so never signed, while some who
signed on August 2nd had not been in Congress on July 4th and so never voted on that auspicious day. The Chapin Library's
copy of the Dunlap broadside is one of only twenty-six known to survive, including fragments, of perhaps one or two hundred
printed (the precise number is not known). It is also one of the best preserved copies, and the only one to have a physical
connection to someone who both voted for Independence and signed the ceremonial Declaration: Joseph Hewes of North
Carolina. Hewes somehow obtained a copy of the broadside from John Hancock - members of Congress do not seem to have
received copies as a matter of course - and wrote on it a docket, "Declaration of Independence".
See the Declaration here.
See the Debates here.
See the Federalist Papers here.
See the Anti-Federalist Papers here.
During the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia in 1787, two drafts of the federal constitution were printed for discussion
by the delegates, in editions of sixty copies each. The first draft was prepared by the Committee of Detail, and when that was
revised, a second draft was prepared by the Committee of Style and Arrangement. The Chapin Library has a copy of the latter,
one of only fourteen still extant, formerly owned and profusely annotated by George Mason of Virginia. His notes on the printed
side of the four leaves record the changes made, and in some cases proposed by Mason, in the final days of debate.
Mason, a longtime friend of George Washington, a noted statesman, author of the Virginia Declaration of Rights (1776), and a
principal speaker at the Constitutional Convention, was also one of three delegates who voted not to approve the final text of
the Constitution. On the blank reverse side of two leaves of his draft copy, Mason wrote out his objections to the Constitution;
these were later printed and circulated. (A full transcription may be read here.) Mason went back to Virginia and worked against
his state's ratification of the Constitution, but did not succeed. His concerns, however, were valid, and for the most part have
been addressed in amendments to the Constitution.
See the Constutition here.
