History concepts and applications

¶ … Declaration of Rights of Man" (1789) and the "Declaration of Independence" (1776)

The Declaration of Independence" by 13 British North American colonies in 1776 and the "Declaration of Rights of Man and Citizens" passed by the National Assembly of France in 1789 are two of the most important documents ever written in the history of Western Civilization. Both the documents were greatly influenced by the Age of Enlightenment and the thoughts of philosophers such as the 17th century Englishman John Locke and the leading French philosopher of the time, Jean Jacques Rousseau. This essay is a comparison of the two documents.

Although The Declaration of Independence (1776) was basically a proclamation of freedom by American colonists from British rule, it was also a statement of principle about the natural and inalienable rights of men and contained a list of grievances against the British monarch of the time, King George III. The Declaration of Rights of Man and Citizens adopted 13 years later in France, on the other hand, was not a proclamation of independence from foreign rule and did not contain grievances against any ruler -- it was, however, similar to the American Declaration of Independence in many ways. The similarity of the two documents is not surprising. Although the main author of the Declaration of Rights of Man and Citizens was Abbe Emmanuel Sieyes, French priest and revolutionary, it is widely believed that its first draft was written one month earlier by the Marquis de Lafayette with help from Thomas Jefferson, who was a personal friend of Lafayette and a U.S. minister to France at the time.

Thomas Jefferson is, of course, the main author of the Declaration of Independence.

The authors of both the documents were influenced by the ideas prevalent in the age of enlightenment in which several philosophers propounded the idea of government as a social contract between the people and their rulers. The French declaration is particularly concerned with asserting the inalienable rights of men to participate in the making of laws and rejecting the divine right of kings to rule that had been age-old basis of most governments in Europe, including France. The document goes on to emphasize the equality of all persons before the law, equitable taxation, protection against loss of property through arbitrary action by the state, freedom of religion, and speech, as well as protection against arbitrary arrest and punishment.

The rationale provided in the American Declaration for the rebellion against the British also relies on the same theory of inalienable rights of men and the social contract. The document has established the right of each individual to rebel against a government that fails to work for his or her benefit.