document_title: United States Declaration of Independence

question_text: when did the declaration of independence get to england

question_tokens: when did the declaration of independence get to england

root

text: United States Declaration of Independence

text: Background

text: Believe me, dear Sir: there is not in the British empire a man who more cordially loves a union with Great Britain than I do. But, by the God that made me, I will cease to exist before I yield to a connection on such terms as the British Parliament propose; and in this, I think I speak the sentiments of America.

tag: p

text: By the time that the Declaration of Independence was adopted in July 1776, the Thirteen Colonies and Great Britain had been at war for more than a year. Relations had been deteriorating between the colonies and the mother country since 1763. Parliament enacted a series of measures to increase revenue from the colonies, such as the Stamp Act of 1765 and the Townshend Acts of 1767. Parliament believed that these acts were a legitimate means of having the colonies pay their fair share of the costs to keep them in the British Empire.[13]

text: Many colonists, however, had developed a different conception of the empire. The colonies were not directly represented in Parliament, and colonists argued that Parliament had no right to levy taxes upon them. This tax dispute was part of a larger divergence between British and American interpretations of the British Constitution and the extent of Parliament's authority in the colonies.[14] The orthodox British view, dating from the Glorious Revolution of 1688, was that Parliament was the supreme authority throughout the empire, and so, by definition, anything that Parliament did was constitutional.[15] In the colonies, however, the idea had developed that the British Constitution recognized certain fundamental rights that no government could violate, not even Parliament.[16] After the Townshend Acts, some essayists even began to question whether Parliament had any legitimate jurisdiction in the colonies at all.[17] Anticipating the arrangement of the British Commonwealth,[18] by 1774 American writers such as Samuel Adams, James Wilson, and Thomas Jefferson were arguing that Parliament was the legislature of Great Britain only, and that the colonies, which had their own legislatures, were connected to the rest of the empire only through their allegiance to the Crown.[19]

text: Congress convenes

text: The issue of Parliament's authority in the colonies became a crisis after Parliament passed the Coercive Acts (known as the Intolerable Acts in the colonies) in 1774 to punish the Province of Massachusetts for the Boston Tea Party of 1773. Many colonists saw the Coercive Acts as a violation of the British Constitution and thus a threat to the liberties of all of British America. In September 1774, the First Continental Congress convened in Philadelphia to coordinate a response. Congress organized a boycott of British goods and petitioned the king for repeal of the acts. These measures were unsuccessful because King George and the ministry of Prime Minister Lord North were determined not to retreat on the question of parliamentary supremacy. As the king wrote to North in November 1774, "blows must decide whether they are to be subject to this country or independent".[20]

text: Most colonists still hoped for reconciliation with Great Britain, even after fighting began in the American Revolutionary War at Lexington and Concord in April 1775.[21] The Second Continental Congress convened at the Pennsylvania State House in Philadelphia in May 1775, and some delegates hoped for eventual independence, but no one yet advocated declaring it.[22] Many colonists no longer believed that Parliament had any sovereignty over them, yet they still professed loyalty to King George, who they hoped would intercede on their behalf. They were disappointed in late 1775, when the king rejected Congress's second petition, issued a Proclamation of Rebellion, and announced before Parliament on October 26 that he was considering "friendly offers of foreign assistance" to suppress the rebellion.[23] A pro-American minority in Parliament warned that the government was driving the colonists toward independence.[24]

text: Toward independence

text: Thomas Paine's pamphlet Common Sense was published in January 1776, just as it became clear in the colonies that the king was not inclined to act as a conciliator.[25] Paine had only recently arrived in the colonies from England, and he argued in favor of colonial independence, advocating republicanism as an alternative to monarchy and hereditary rule.[26] Common Sense introduced no new ideas[27] and probably had little direct effect on Congress's thinking about independence; its importance was in stimulating public debate on a topic that few had previously dared to openly discuss.[28] Public support for separation from Great Britain steadily increased after the publication of Paine's enormously popular pamphlet.[29]

text: Some colonists still held out hope for reconciliation, but developments in early 1776 further strengthened public support for independence. In February 1776, colonists learned of Parliament's passage of the Prohibitory Act, which established a blockade of American ports and declared American ships to be enemy vessels. John Adams, a strong supporter of independence, believed that Parliament had effectively declared American independence before Congress had been able to. Adams labeled the Prohibitory Act the "Act of Independency", calling it "a compleat Dismemberment of the British Empire".[30] Support for declaring independence grew even more when it was confirmed that King George had hired German mercenaries to use against his American subjects.[31]

text: Despite this growing popular support for independence, Congress lacked the clear authority to declare it. Delegates had been elected to Congress by thirteen different governments, which included extralegal conventions, ad hoc committees, and elected assemblies, and they were bound by the instructions given to them. Regardless of their personal opinions, delegates could not vote to declare independence unless their instructions permitted such an action.[32] Several colonies, in fact, expressly prohibited their delegates from taking any steps towards separation from Great Britain, while other delegations had instructions that were ambiguous on the issue.[33] As public sentiment grew for separation from Great Britain, advocates of independence sought to have the Congressional instructions revised. For Congress to declare independence, a majority of delegations would need authorization to vote for independence, and at least one colonial government would need to specifically instruct (or grant permission for) its delegation to propose a declaration of independence in Congress. Between April and July 1776, a "complex political war"[34] was waged to bring this about.[35]

text: Revising instructions

text: In the campaign to revise Congressional instructions, many Americans formally expressed their support for separation from Great Britain in what were effectively state and local declarations of independence. Historian Pauline Maier identifies more than ninety such declarations that were issued throughout the Thirteen Colonies from April to July 1776.[36] These "declarations" took a variety of forms. Some were formal written instructions for Congressional delegations, such as the Halifax Resolves of April 12, with which North Carolina became the first colony to explicitly authorize its delegates to vote for independence.[37] Others were legislative acts that officially ended British rule in individual colonies, such as the Rhode Island legislature declaring its independence from Great Britain on May 4, the first colony to do so.[38] Many "declarations" were resolutions adopted at town or county meetings that offered support for independence. A few came in the form of jury instructions, such as the statement issued on April 23, 1776 by Chief Justice William Henry Drayton of South Carolina: "the law of the land authorizes me to declare...that George the Third, King of Great Britain...has no authority over us, and we owe no obedience to him."[39] Most of these declarations are now obscure, having been overshadowed by the declaration approved by Congress on July 2, and signed July 4.[40]

text: Some colonies held back from endorsing independence. Resistance was centered in the middle colonies of New York, New Jersey, Maryland, Pennsylvania, and Delaware.[41] Advocates of independence saw Pennsylvania as the key; if that colony could be converted to the pro-independence cause, it was believed that the others would follow.[41] On May 1, however, opponents of independence retained control of the Pennsylvania Assembly in a special election that had focused on the question of independence.[42] In response, Congress passed a resolution on May 10 which had been promoted by John Adams and Richard Henry Lee, calling on colonies without a "government sufficient to the exigencies of their affairs" to adopt new governments.[43] The resolution passed unanimously, and was even supported by Pennsylvania's John Dickinson, the leader of the anti-independence faction in Congress, who believed that it did not apply to his colony.[44]

text: May 15 preamble

text:
This Day the Congress has passed the most important Resolution, that ever was taken in America.

—John Adams, May 15, 1776[45]

text: As was the custom, Congress appointed a committee to draft a preamble to explain the purpose of the resolution. John Adams wrote the preamble, which stated that because King George had rejected reconciliation and was hiring foreign mercenaries to use against the colonies, "it is necessary that the exercise of every kind of authority under the said crown should be totally suppressed".[46] Adams's preamble was meant to encourage the overthrow of the governments of Pennsylvania and Maryland, which were still under proprietary governance.[47] Congress passed the preamble on May 15 after several days of debate, but four of the middle colonies voted against it, and the Maryland delegation walked out in protest.[48] Adams regarded his May 15 preamble effectively as an American declaration of independence, although a formal declaration would still have to be made.[49]

text: Lee's resolution

text: On the same day that Congress passed Adams's radical preamble, the Virginia Convention set the stage for a formal Congressional declaration of independence. On May 15, the Convention instructed Virginia's congressional delegation "to propose to that respectable body to declare the United Colonies free and independent States, absolved from all allegiance to, or dependence upon, the Crown or Parliament of Great Britain".[50] In accordance with those instructions, Richard Henry Lee of Virginia presented a three-part resolution to Congress on June 7.[51] The motion was seconded by John Adams, calling on Congress to declare independence, form foreign alliances, and prepare a plan of colonial confederation. The part of the resolution relating to declaring independence read:

text: Resolved, that these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States, that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved.[52]

text: Lee's resolution met with resistance in the ensuing debate. Opponents of the resolution conceded that reconciliation was unlikely with Great Britain, while arguing that declaring independence was premature, and that securing foreign aid should take priority.[53] Advocates of the resolution countered that foreign governments would not intervene in an internal British struggle, and so a formal declaration of independence was needed before foreign aid was possible. All Congress needed to do, they insisted, was to "declare a fact which already exists".[54] Delegates from Pennsylvania, Delaware, New Jersey, Maryland, and New York were still not yet authorized to vote for independence, however, and some of them threatened to leave Congress if the resolution were adopted. Congress, therefore, voted on June 10 to postpone further discussion of Lee's resolution for three weeks.[55] Until then, Congress decided that a committee should prepare a document announcing and explaining independence in the event that Lee's resolution was approved when it was brought up again in July.

text: The final push

text: Support for a Congressional declaration of independence was consolidated in the final weeks of June 1776. On June 14, the Connecticut Assembly instructed its delegates to propose independence and, the following day, the legislatures of New Hampshire and Delaware authorized their delegates to declare independence.[56] In Pennsylvania, political struggles ended with the dissolution of the colonial assembly, and a new Conference of Committees under Thomas McKean authorized Pennsylvania's delegates to declare independence on June 18.[57] The Provincial Congress of New Jersey had been governing the province since January 1776; they resolved on June 15 that Royal Governor William Franklin was "an enemy to the liberties of this country" and had him arrested.[58] On June 21, they chose new delegates to Congress and empowered them to join in a declaration of independence.[59]

text: Only Maryland and New York had yet to authorize independence towards the end of June. Previously, Maryland's delegates had walked out when the Continental Congress adopted Adams's radical May 15 preamble, and had sent to the Annapolis Convention for instructions.[60] On May 20, the Annapolis Convention rejected Adams's preamble, instructing its delegates to remain against independence. But Samuel Chase went to Maryland and, thanks to local resolutions in favor of independence, was able to get the Annapolis Convention to change its mind on June 28.[61] Only the New York delegates were unable to get revised instructions. When Congress had been considering the resolution of independence on June 8, the New York Provincial Congress told the delegates to wait.[62] But on June 30, the Provincial Congress evacuated New York as British forces approached, and would not convene again until July 10. This meant that New York's delegates would not be authorized to declare independence until after Congress had made its decision.[63]

text: Draft and adoption

text: Political maneuvering was setting the stage for an official declaration of independence even while a document was being written to explain the decision. On June 11, 1776, Congress appointed a "Committee of Five" to draft a declaration, consisting of John Adams of Massachusetts, Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania, Thomas Jefferson of Virginia, Robert R. Livingston of New York, and Roger Sherman of Connecticut. The committee left no minutes, so there is some uncertainty about how the drafting process proceeded; contradictory accounts were written many years later by Jefferson and Adams, too many years to be regarded as entirely reliable—although their accounts are frequently cited.[65] What is certain is that the committee discussed the general outline which the document should follow and decided that Jefferson would write the first draft.[66] The committee in general, and Jefferson in particular, thought that Adams should write the document, but Adams persuaded the committee to choose Jefferson and promised to consult with him personally.[3] Considering Congress's busy schedule, Jefferson probably had limited time for writing over the next seventeen days, and likely wrote the draft quickly.[67] He then consulted the others and made some changes, and then produced another copy incorporating these alterations. The committee presented this copy to the Congress on June 28, 1776. The title of the document was "A Declaration by the Representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress assembled."[68]

text: Congress ordered that the draft "lie on the table".[69] For two days, Congress methodically edited Jefferson's primary document, shortening it by a fourth, removing unnecessary wording, and improving sentence structure.[70] They removed Jefferson's assertion that Britain had forced slavery on the colonies in order to moderate the document and appease persons in Britain who supported the Revolution.[citation needed] Jefferson wrote that Congress had "mangled" his draft version, but the Declaration that was finally produced was "the majestic document that inspired both contemporaries and posterity," in the words of his biographer John Ferling.[70]

text: Congress tabled the draft of the declaration on Monday, July 1 and resolved itself into a committee of the whole, with Benjamin Harrison of Virginia presiding, and they resumed debate on Lee's resolution of independence.[71] John Dickinson made one last effort to delay the decision, arguing that Congress should not declare independence without first securing a foreign alliance and finalizing the Articles of Confederation.[72] John Adams gave a speech in reply to Dickinson, restating the case for an immediate declaration.

text: A vote was taken after a long day of speeches, each colony casting a single vote, as always. The delegation for each colony numbered from two to seven members, and each delegation voted amongst themselves to determine the colony's vote. Pennsylvania and South Carolina voted against declaring independence. The New York delegation abstained, lacking permission to vote for independence. Delaware cast no vote because the delegation was split between Thomas McKean (who voted yes) and George Read (who voted no). The remaining nine delegations voted in favor of independence, which meant that the resolution had been approved by the committee of the whole. The next step was for the resolution to be voted upon by Congress itself. Edward Rutledge of South Carolina was opposed to Lee's resolution but desirous of unanimity, and he moved that the vote be postponed until the following day.[73]

text: On July 2, South Carolina reversed its position and voted for independence. In the Pennsylvania delegation, Dickinson and Robert Morris abstained, allowing the delegation to vote three-to-two in favor of independence. The tie in the Delaware delegation was broken by the timely arrival of Caesar Rodney, who voted for independence. The New York delegation abstained once again since they were still not authorized to vote for independence, although they were allowed to do so a week later by the New York Provincial Congress.[74] The resolution of independence had been adopted with twelve affirmative votes and one abstention. With this, the colonies had officially severed political ties with Great Britain.[75] John Adams predicted in a famous letter, written to his wife on the following day, that July 2 would become a great American holiday.[76] He thought that the vote for independence would be commemorated; he did not foresee that Americans—including himself—would instead celebrate Independence Day on the date when the announcement of that act was finalized.[77]

text: After voting in favor of the resolution of independence, Congress turned its attention to the committee's draft of the declaration. Over several days of debate, they made a few changes in wording and deleted nearly a fourth of the text and, on July 4, 1776, the wording of the Declaration of Independence was approved and sent to the printer for publication.

text: There is a distinct change in wording from this original broadside printing of the Declaration and the final official engrossed copy. The word "unanimous" was inserted as a result of a Congressional resolution passed on July 19, 1776:

text: Resolved, That the Declaration passed on the 4th, be fairly engrossed on parchment, with the title and stile of "The unanimous declaration of the thirteen United States of America," and that the same, when engrossed, be signed by every member of Congress.[79]

text: Annotated text of the engrossed declaration

text: The declaration is not divided into formal sections; but it is often discussed as consisting of five parts: introduction, preamble, indictment of King George III, denunciation of the British people, and conclusion.[80]

text:
Introduction

Asserts as a matter of Natural Law the ability of a people to assume political independence; acknowledges that the grounds for such independence must be reasonable, and therefore explicable, and ought to be explained.

In CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen United States of America,
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

Preamble

Outlines a general philosophy of government that justifies revolution when government harms natural rights.[80]

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, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

Indictment

A bill of particulars documenting the king's "repeated injuries and usurpations" of the Americans' rights and liberties.[80]

Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness of his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Denunciation

This section essentially finishes the case for independence. The conditions that justified revolution have been shown.[80]

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

Conclusion

The signers assert that there exist conditions under which people must change their government, that the British have produced such conditions and, by necessity, the colonies must throw off political ties with the British Crown and become independent states. The conclusion contains, at its core, the Lee Resolution that had been passed on July 2.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

Signatures

The first and most famous signature on the engrossed copy was that of John Hancock, President of the Continental Congress. Two future presidents (Thomas Jefferson and John Adams) and a father and great-grandfather of two other presidents (Benjamin Harrison) were among the signatories. Edward Rutledge (age 26) was the youngest signer, and Benjamin Franklin (age 70) was the oldest signer. The fifty-six signers of the Declaration represented the new states as follows (from north to south):[81]

New Hampshire: Josiah Bartlett, William Whipple, Matthew Thornton
Massachusetts: Samuel Adams, John Adams, John Hancock, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry
Rhode Island: Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery
Connecticut: Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott
New York: William Floyd, Philip Livingston, Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris
New Jersey: Richard Stockton, John Witherspoon, Francis Hopkinson, John Hart, Abraham Clark
Pennsylvania: Robert Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benjamin Franklin, John Morton, George Clymer, James Smith, George Taylor, James Wilson, George Ross
Delaware: George Read, Caesar Rodney, Thomas McKean
Maryland: Samuel Chase, William Paca, Thomas Stone, Charles Carroll of Carrollton
Virginia: George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Nelson, Jr., Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton
North Carolina: William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn
South Carolina: Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward, Jr., Thomas Lynch, Jr., Arthur Middleton
Georgia: Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton

tag: table

text: Influences and legal status

text: Historians have often sought to identify the sources that most influenced the words and political philosophy of the Declaration of Independence. By Jefferson's own admission, the Declaration contained no original ideas, but was instead a statement of sentiments widely shared by supporters of the American Revolution. As he explained in 1825:

text: Neither aiming at originality of principle or sentiment, nor yet copied from any particular and previous writing, it was intended to be an expression of the American mind, and to give to that expression the proper tone and spirit called for by the occasion.[82]

text: Jefferson's most immediate sources were two documents written in June 1776: his own draft of the preamble of the Constitution of Virginia, and George Mason's draft of the Virginia Declaration of Rights. Ideas and phrases from both of these documents appear in the Declaration of Independence.[83] They were, in turn, directly influenced by the 1689 English Declaration of Rights, which formally ended the reign of King James II.[84] During the American Revolution, Jefferson and other Americans looked to the English Declaration of Rights as a model of how to end the reign of an unjust king.[85] The Scottish Declaration of Arbroath (1320) and the Dutch Act of Abjuration (1581) have also been offered as models for Jefferson's Declaration, but these models are now accepted by few scholars.[86]

text: Jefferson wrote that a number of authors exerted a general influence on the words of the Declaration.[87] English political theorist John Locke is usually cited as one of the primary influences, a man whom Jefferson called one of "the three greatest men that have ever lived".[88] In 1922, historian Carl L. Becker wrote, "Most Americans had absorbed Locke's works as a kind of political gospel; and the Declaration, in its form, in its phraseology, follows closely certain sentences in Locke's second treatise on government."[89] The extent of Locke's influence on the American Revolution has been questioned by some subsequent scholars, however. Historian Ray Forrest Harvey argued in 1937 for the dominant influence of Swiss jurist Jean Jacques Burlamaqui, declaring that Jefferson and Locke were at "two opposite poles" in their political philosophy, as evidenced by Jefferson's use in the Declaration of Independence of the phrase "pursuit of happiness" instead of "property".[90] Other scholars emphasized the influence of republicanism rather than Locke's classical liberalism.[91] Historian Garry Wills argued that Jefferson was influenced by the Scottish Enlightenment, particularly Francis Hutcheson, rather than Locke,[92] an interpretation that has been strongly criticized.[93]

text: Legal historian John Phillip Reid has written that the emphasis on the political philosophy of the Declaration has been misplaced. The Declaration is not a philosophical tract about natural rights, argues Reid, but is instead a legal document—an indictment against King George for violating the constitutional rights of the colonists.[94] Historian David Armitage has argued that the Declaration was strongly influenced by de Vattel's The Law of Nations, the dominant international law treatise of the period, and a book that Benjamin Franklin said was "continually in the hands of the members of our Congress".[95] Armitage writes, "Vattel made independence fundamental to his definition of statehood"; therefore, the primary purpose of the Declaration was "to express the international legal sovereignty of the United States". If the United States were to have any hope of being recognized by the European powers, the American revolutionaries first had to make it clear that they were no longer dependent on Great Britain.[96] The Declaration of Independence does not have the force of law domestically, but nevertheless it may help to provide historical and legal clarity about the Constitution and other laws.[97][98][99][100]

text: Signing

text: The Declaration became official when Congress voted for it on July 4; signatures of the delegates were not needed to make it official. The handwritten copy of the Declaration of Independence that was signed by Congress is dated July 4, 1776. The signatures of fifty-six delegates are affixed; however, the exact date when each person signed it has long been the subject of debate. Jefferson, Franklin, and Adams all wrote that the Declaration had been signed by Congress on July 4.[101] But in 1796, signer Thomas McKean disputed that the Declaration had been signed on July 4, pointing out that some signers were not then present, including several who were not even elected to Congress until after that date.[102]

text: The Declaration was transposed on paper, adopted by the Continental Congress, and signed by John Hancock, President of the Congress, on July 4, 1776, according to the 1911 record of events by the U.S. State Department under Secretary Philander C. Knox.[103] On August 2, 1776, a parchment paper copy of the Declaration was signed by 56 persons.[103] Many of these signers were not present when the original Declaration was adopted on July 4.[103] Signer Matthew Thornton from New Hampshire was seated in the Continental Congress in November; he asked for and received the privilege of adding his signature at that time, and signed on November 4, 1776.[103]

text: Historians have generally accepted McKean's version of events, arguing that the famous signed version of the Declaration was created after July 19, and was not signed by Congress until August 2, 1776.[104] In 1986, legal historian Wilfred Ritz argued that historians had misunderstood the primary documents and given too much credence to McKean, who had not been present in Congress on July 4.[105] According to Ritz, about thirty-four delegates signed the Declaration on July 4, and the others signed on or after August 2.[106] Historians who reject a July 4 signing maintain that most delegates signed on August 2, and that those eventual signers who were not present added their names later.[107]

text: Two future U.S. presidents were among the signatories: Thomas Jefferson and John Adams. The most famous signature on the engrossed copy is that of John Hancock, who presumably signed first as President of Congress.[108] Hancock's large, flamboyant signature became iconic, and the term John Hancock emerged in the United States as an informal synonym for "signature".[109] A commonly circulated but apocryphal account claims that, after Hancock signed, the delegate from Massachusetts commented, "The British ministry can read that name without spectacles." Another apocryphal report indicates that Hancock proudly declared, "There! I guess King George will be able to read that!"[110]

text: Various legends emerged years later about the signing of the Declaration, when the document had become an important national symbol. In one famous story, John Hancock supposedly said that Congress, having signed the Declaration, must now "all hang together", and Benjamin Franklin replied: "Yes, we must indeed all hang together, or most assuredly we shall all hang separately." The quotation did not appear in print until more than fifty years after Franklin's death.[111]

text: The Syng inkstand used at the signing was also used at the signing of the United States Constitution in 1787.

text: Publication and reaction

text: After Congress approved the final wording of the Declaration on July 4, a handwritten copy was sent a few blocks away to the printing shop of John Dunlap. Through the night, Dunlap printed about 200 broadsides for distribution. Before long, the Declaration was read to audiences and reprinted in newspapers throughout the thirteen states. The first official public reading of the document was by John Nixon in the yard of Independence Hall on July 8; public readings also took place on that day in Trenton, New Jersey and Easton, Pennsylvania.[112] A German translation of the Declaration was published in Philadelphia by July 9.[113]

text: President of Congress John Hancock sent a broadside to General George Washington, instructing him to have it proclaimed "at the Head of the Army in the way you shall think it most proper".[114] Washington had the Declaration read to his troops in New York City on July 9, with thousands of British troops on ships in the harbor. Washington and Congress hoped that the Declaration would inspire the soldiers, and encourage others to join the army.[112] After hearing the Declaration, crowds in many cities tore down and destroyed signs or statues representing royal authority. An equestrian statue of King George in New York City was pulled down and the lead used to make musket balls.[115]

text: British officials in North America sent copies of the Declaration to Great Britain.[116] It was published in British newspapers beginning in mid-August, it had reached Florence and Warsaw by mid-September, and a German translation appeared in Switzerland by October. The first copy of the Declaration sent to France got lost, and the second copy arrived only in November 1776.[117] It reached Portuguese America by Brazilian medical student "Vendek" José Joaquim Maia e Barbalho, who had met with Thomas Jefferson in Nîmes.

text: The Spanish-American authorities banned the circulation of the Declaration, but it was widely transmitted and translated: by Venezuelan Manuel García de Sena, by Colombian Miguel de Pombo, by Ecuadorian Vicente Rocafuerte, and by New Englanders Richard Cleveland and William Shaler, who distributed the Declaration and the United States Constitution among creoles in Chile and Indians in Mexico in 1821.[118] The North Ministry did not give an official answer to the Declaration, but instead secretly commissioned pamphleteer John Lind to publish a response entitled Answer to the Declaration of the American Congress.[119] British Tories denounced the signers of the Declaration for not applying the same principles of "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" to African Americans.[120] Thomas Hutchinson, the former royal governor of Massachusetts, also published a rebuttal.[121][122] These pamphlets challenged various aspects of the Declaration. Hutchinson argued that the American Revolution was the work of a few conspirators who wanted independence from the outset, and who had finally achieved it by inducing otherwise loyal colonists to rebel.[123] Lind's pamphlet had an anonymous attack on the concept of natural rights written by Jeremy Bentham, an argument that he repeated during the French Revolution.[124] Both pamphlets asked how the American slaveholders in Congress could proclaim that "all men are created equal" without freeing their own slaves.[125]

text: William Whipple, a signer of the Declaration of Independence who had fought in the war, freed his slave Prince Whipple because of revolutionary ideals. In the postwar decades, other slaveholders also freed their slaves; from 1790 to 1810, the percentage of free blacks in the Upper South increased to 8.3 percent from less than one percent of the black population.[126] All Northern states abolished slavery by 1804.

text: History of the documents

text: The official copy of the Declaration of Independence was the one printed on July 4, 1776 under Jefferson's supervision. It was sent to the states and to the Army and was widely reprinted in newspapers. The slightly different "engrossed copy" (shown at the top of this article) was made later for members to sign. The engrossed version is the one widely distributed in the 21st century. Note that the opening lines differ between the two versions.[78]

text: The copy of the Declaration that was signed by Congress is known as the engrossed or parchment copy. It was probably engrossed (that is, carefully handwritten) by clerk Timothy Matlack.[127] A facsimile made in 1823 has become the basis of most modern reproductions rather than the original because of poor conservation of the engrossed copy through the 19th century.[127] In 1921, custody of the engrossed copy of the Declaration was transferred from the State Department to the Library of Congress, along with the United States Constitution. After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, the documents were moved for safekeeping to the United States Bullion Depository at Fort Knox in Kentucky, where they were kept until 1944.[128] In 1952, the engrossed Declaration was transferred to the National Archives and is now on permanent display at the National Archives in the "Rotunda for the Charters of Freedom".[129]

text: The document signed by Congress and enshrined in the National Archives is usually regarded as the Declaration of Independence, but historian Julian P. Boyd argued that the Declaration, like Magna Carta, is not a single document. Boyd considered the printed broadsides ordered by Congress to be official texts, as well. The Declaration was first published as a broadside that was printed the night of July 4 by John Dunlap of Philadelphia. Dunlap printed about 200 broadsides, of which 26 are known to survive. The 26th copy was discovered in The National Archives in England in 2009.[130]

text: In 1777, Congress commissioned Mary Katherine Goddard to print a new broadside that listed the signers of the Declaration, unlike the Dunlap broadside.[127][131] Nine copies of the Goddard broadside are known to still exist.[131] A variety of broadsides printed by the states are also extant.[131]

text: Several early handwritten copies and drafts of the Declaration have also been preserved. Jefferson kept a four-page draft that late in life he called the "original Rough draught".[132] It is not known how many drafts Jefferson wrote prior to this one, and how much of the text was contributed by other committee members. In 1947, Boyd discovered a fragment of an earlier draft in Jefferson's handwriting.[133] Jefferson and Adams sent copies of the rough draft to friends, with slight variations.

text: During the writing process, Jefferson showed the rough draft to Adams and Franklin, and perhaps to other members of the drafting committee,[132] who made a few more changes. Franklin, for example, may have been responsible for changing Jefferson's original phrase "We hold these truths to be sacred and undeniable" to "We hold these truths to be self-evident".[134] Jefferson incorporated these changes into a copy that was submitted to Congress in the name of the committee.[132] The copy that was submitted to Congress on June 28 has been lost, and was perhaps destroyed in the printing process,[135] or destroyed during the debates in accordance with Congress's secrecy rule.[136]

text: On April 21, 2017 it was announced that a second engrossed copy had been discovered in an archive in Sussex, England. Named by its finders the "Sussex Declaration", it differs from the National Archives copy (which the finders refer to as the "Matlack Declaration") in that the signatures on it are not grouped by States. How it came to be in England is not yet known, but the finders believe that the randomness of the signatures points to an origin with signatory James Wilson, who had argued strongly that the Declaration was made not by the States but by the whole people.[137][138]

text: Legacy

text: The Declaration was neglected in the years immediately following the American Revolution, having served its original purpose in announcing the independence of the United States.[139] Early celebrations of Independence Day largely ignored the Declaration, as did early histories of the Revolution. The act of declaring independence was considered important, whereas the text announcing that act attracted little attention.[140] The Declaration was rarely mentioned during the debates about the United States Constitution, and its language was not incorporated into that document.[141] George Mason's draft of the Virginia Declaration of Rights was more influential, and its language was echoed in state constitutions and state bills of rights more often than Jefferson's words.[142] "In none of these documents", wrote Pauline Maier, "is there any evidence whatsoever that the Declaration of Independence lived in men's minds as a classic statement of American political principles."[143]

text: Influence in other countries

text: Many leaders of the French Revolution admired the Declaration of Independence[143] but were also interested in the new American state constitutions.[144] The inspiration and content of the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen (1789) emerged largely from the ideals of the American Revolution.[145] Its key drafts were prepared by Lafayette, working closely in Paris with his friend Thomas Jefferson. It also borrowed language from George Mason's Virginia Declaration of Rights.[146][147] The declaration also influenced the Russian Empire. The document had a particular impact on the Decembrist revolt and other Russian thinkers.

text: According to historian David Armitage, the Declaration of Independence did prove to be internationally influential, but not as a statement of human rights. Armitage argued that the Declaration was the first in a new genre of declarations of independence that announced the creation of new states.

text: Other French leaders were directly influenced by the text of the Declaration of Independence itself. The Manifesto of the Province of Flanders (1790) was the first foreign derivation of the Declaration;[148] others include the Venezuelan Declaration of Independence (1811), the Liberian Declaration of Independence (1847), the declarations of secession by the Confederate States of America (1860–61), and the Vietnamese Proclamation of Independence (1945).[149] These declarations echoed the United States Declaration of Independence in announcing the independence of a new state, without necessarily endorsing the political philosophy of the original.[150]

text: Other countries have used the Declaration as inspiration or have directly copied sections from it. These include the Haitian declaration of January 1, 1804 during the Haitian Revolution, the United Provinces of New Granada in 1811, the Argentine Declaration of Independence in 1816, the Chilean Declaration of Independence in 1818, Costa Rica in 1821, El Salvador in 1821, Guatemala in 1821, Honduras in (1821), Mexico in 1821, Nicaragua in 1821, Peru in 1821, Bolivian War of Independence in 1825, Uruguay in 1825, Ecuador in 1830, Colombia in 1831, Paraguay in 1842, Dominican Republic in 1844, Texas Declaration of Independence in March 1836, California Republic in November 1836, Hungarian Declaration of Independence in 1849, Declaration of the Independence of New Zealand in 1835, and the Czechoslovak declaration of independence from 1918 drafted in Washington D.C. with Gutzon Borglum among the drafters. The Rhodesian declaration of independence, ratified in November 1965, is based on the American one as well; however, it omits the phrases "all men are created equal" and "the consent of the governed".[118][151][152][153] The South Carolina declaration of secession from December 1860 also mentions the U.S. Declaration of Independence, though it, like the Rhodesian one, omits references to "all men are created equal" and "consent of the governed".

text: Revival of interest

text: Interest in the Declaration was revived in the 1790s with the emergence of the United States's first political parties.[154] Throughout the 1780s, few Americans knew or cared who wrote the Declaration.[155] But in the next decade, Jeffersonian Republicans sought political advantage over their rival Federalists by promoting both the importance of the Declaration and Jefferson as its author.[156] Federalists responded by casting doubt on Jefferson's authorship or originality, and by emphasizing that independence was declared by the whole Congress, with Jefferson as just one member of the drafting committee. Federalists insisted that Congress's act of declaring independence, in which Federalist John Adams had played a major role, was more important than the document announcing it.[157] But this view faded away, like the Federalist Party itself, and, before long, the act of declaring independence became synonymous with the document.

text: A less partisan appreciation for the Declaration emerged in the years following the War of 1812, thanks to a growing American nationalism and a renewed interest in the history of the Revolution.[158] In 1817, Congress commissioned John Trumbull's famous painting of the signers, which was exhibited to large crowds before being installed in the Capitol.[159] The earliest commemorative printings of the Declaration also appeared at this time, offering many Americans their first view of the signed document.[160] Collective biographies of the signers were first published in the 1820s,[161] giving birth to what Garry Wills called the "cult of the signers".[162] In the years that followed, many stories about the writing and signing of the document were published for the first time.

text: When interest in the Declaration was revived, the sections that were most important in 1776 were no longer relevant: the announcement of the independence of the United States and the grievances against King George. But the second paragraph was applicable long after the war had ended, with its talk of self-evident truths and unalienable rights.[163] The Constitution and the Bill of Rights lacked sweeping statements about rights and equality, and advocates of groups with grievances turned to the Declaration for support.[164] Starting in the 1820s, variations of the Declaration were issued to proclaim the rights of workers, farmers, women, and others.[165] In 1848, for example, the Seneca Falls Convention of women's rights advocates declared that "all men and women are created equal".[166]

text: John Trumbull's Declaration of Independence (1817–1826)

text: A key step marking the evolution of the Declaration in the nation's consciousness is the now well-known painting Declaration of Independence by Connecticut political painter John Trumbull. It was commissioned by the United States Congress in 1817. 12-by-18-foot (3.7 by 5.5 m) in size, it has hung in the United States Capitol Rotunda since 1826. It has been often reproduced, and is the visual image most associated by Americans with the Declaration.

text: The painting is sometimes incorrectly described as the signing of the Declaration of Independence. In fact, the painting actually shows the five-man drafting committee presenting their draft of the Declaration to the Second Continental Congress, an event that took place on June 28, 1776, and not the signing of the document, which took place later.[168]

text: The painting, the figures painted from life when possible, does not contain all the signers. Some had died and images could not be located. One figure had participated in the drafting but did not sign the final document; another refused to sign. In fact the membership of the Second Continental Congress changed as time passed, and the figures in the painting were never in the same room at the same time.

text: It is, however, an accurate depiction of the room in the building known today as Independence Hall, the centerpiece of the Independence National Historical Park in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Trumbull visited the room, which was where the Second Continental Congress met, when researching for his painting. At the time it was the Pennsylvania State House.

text: Slavery and the Declaration

text: The apparent contradiction between the claim that "all men are created equal" and the existence of American slavery attracted comment when the Declaration was first published. As mentioned above, Jefferson had included a paragraph in his initial draft that strongly indicted Great Britain's role in the slave trade, but this was deleted from the final version.[169] Jefferson himself was a prominent Virginia slave holder, having owned hundreds of slaves.[170] Referring to this seeming contradiction, English abolitionist Thomas Day wrote in a 1776 letter, "If there be an object truly ridiculous in nature, it is an American patriot, signing resolutions of independency with the one hand, and with the other brandishing a whip over his affrighted slaves."[171]

text: In the 19th century, the Declaration took on a special significance for the abolitionist movement. Historian Bertram Wyatt-Brown wrote that "abolitionists tended to interpret the Declaration of Independence as a theological as well as a political document".[172] Abolitionist leaders Benjamin Lundy and William Lloyd Garrison adopted the "twin rocks" of "the Bible and the Declaration of Independence" as the basis for their philosophies. "As long as there remains a single copy of the Declaration of Independence, or of the Bible, in our land," wrote Garrison, "we will not despair."[173] For radical abolitionists such as Garrison, the most important part of the Declaration was its assertion of the right of revolution. Garrison called for the destruction of the government under the Constitution, and the creation of a new state dedicated to the principles of the Declaration.[174]

text: The controversial question of whether to add additional slave states to the United States coincided with the growing stature of the Declaration. The first major public debate about slavery and the Declaration took place during the Missouri controversy of 1819 to 1821.[175] Antislavery Congressmen argued that the language of the Declaration indicated that the Founding Fathers of the United States had been opposed to slavery in principle, and so new slave states should not be added to the country.[176] Proslavery Congressmen led by Senator Nathaniel Macon of North Carolina argued that the Declaration was not a part of the Constitution and therefore had no relevance to the question.[177]

text: With the antislavery movement gaining momentum, defenders of slavery such as John Randolph and John C. Calhoun found it necessary to argue that the Declaration's assertion that "all men are created equal" was false, or at least that it did not apply to black people.[178] During the debate over the Kansas–Nebraska Act in 1853, for example, Senator John Pettit of Indiana argued that the statement "all men are created equal" was not a "self-evident truth" but a "self-evident lie".[179] Opponents of the Kansas–Nebraska Act, including Salmon P. Chase and Benjamin Wade, defended the Declaration and what they saw as its antislavery principles.[180]

text: Lincoln and the Declaration

text: The Declaration's relationship to slavery was taken up in 1854 by Abraham Lincoln, a little-known former Congressman who idolized the Founding Fathers.[181] Lincoln thought that the Declaration of Independence expressed the highest principles of the American Revolution, and that the Founding Fathers had tolerated slavery with the expectation that it would ultimately wither away.[10] For the United States to legitimize the expansion of slavery in the Kansas-Nebraska Act, thought Lincoln, was to repudiate the principles of the Revolution. In his October 1854 Peoria speech, Lincoln said:

text: Nearly eighty years ago we began by declaring that all men are created equal; but now from that beginning we have run down to the other declaration, that for some men to enslave others is a "sacred right of self-government".… Our republican robe is soiled and trailed in the dust.… Let us repurify it. Let us re-adopt the Declaration of Independence, and with it, the practices, and policy, which harmonize with it.… If we do this, we shall not only have saved the Union: but we shall have saved it, as to make, and keep it, forever worthy of the saving.[182]

text: The meaning of the Declaration was a recurring topic in the famed debates between Lincoln and Stephen Douglas in 1858. Douglas argued that the phrase "all men are created equal" in the Declaration referred to white men only. The purpose of the Declaration, he said, had simply been to justify the independence of the United States, and not to proclaim the equality of any "inferior or degraded race".[183] Lincoln, however, thought that the language of the Declaration was deliberately universal, setting a high moral standard to which the American republic should aspire. "I had thought the Declaration contemplated the progressive improvement in the condition of all men everywhere," he said.[184] During the seventh and last joint debate with Steven Douglas at Alton, Illinois on October 15, 1858, Lincoln said about the declaration:

text: I think the authors of that notable instrument intended to include all men, but they did not mean to declare all men equal in all respects. They did not mean to say all men were equal in color, size, intellect, moral development, or social capacity. They defined with tolerable distinctness in what they did consider all men created equal—equal in "certain inalienable rights, among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." This they said, and this they meant. They did not mean to assert the obvious untruth that all were then actually enjoying that equality, or yet that they were about to confer it immediately upon them. In fact, they had no power to confer such a boon. They meant simply to declare the right, so that the enforcement of it might follow as fast as circumstances should permit. They meant to set up a standard maxim for free society which should be familiar to all, constantly looked to, constantly labored for, and even, though never perfectly attained, constantly approximated, and thereby constantly spreading and deepening its influence, and augmenting the happiness and value of life to all people, of all colors, everywhere.[185]

text: According to Pauline Maier, Douglas's interpretation was more historically accurate, but Lincoln's view ultimately prevailed. "In Lincoln's hands," wrote Maier, "the Declaration of Independence became first and foremost a living document" with "a set of goals to be realized over time".[186]

text:
[T]here is no reason in the world why the negro is not entitled to all the natural rights enumerated in the Declaration of Independence, the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. I hold that he is as much entitled to these as the white man.

Abraham Lincoln, 1858[187]

text: Like Daniel Webster, James Wilson, and Joseph Story before him, Lincoln argued that the Declaration of Independence was a founding document of the United States, and that this had important implications for interpreting the Constitution, which had been ratified more than a decade after the Declaration.[188] The Constitution did not use the word "equality", yet Lincoln believed that the concept that "all men are created equal" remained a part of the nation's founding principles.[189] He famously expressed this belief in the opening sentence of his 1863 Gettysburg Address: "Four score and seven years ago [i.e. in 1776] our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal."

text: Lincoln's view of the Declaration became influential, seeing it as a moral guide to interpreting the Constitution. "For most people now," wrote Garry Wills in 1992, "the Declaration means what Lincoln told us it means, as a way of correcting the Constitution itself without overthrowing it."[190] Admirers of Lincoln such as Harry V. Jaffa praised this development. Critics of Lincoln, notably Willmoore Kendall and Mel Bradford, argued that Lincoln dangerously expanded the scope of the national government and violated states' rights by reading the Declaration into the Constitution.[191]

text: Women's suffrage and the Declaration

text: In July 1848, the first woman's rights convention, the Seneca Falls Convention, was held in Seneca Falls, New York. The convention was organized by Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Lucretia Mott, Mary Ann McClintock, and Jane Hunt. In their "Declaration of Sentiments", patterned on the Declaration of Independence, the convention members demanded social and political equality for women. Their motto was that "All men and women are created equal" and the convention demanded suffrage for women. The suffrage movement was supported by William Lloyd Garrison and Frederick Douglass.[192][193]

text: Twentieth century and later

text:
Bicentennial Eisenhower dollar (1976).

Obverse: Eisenhower portrait, US national motto, "Liberty" on top, US Independence year (1776) and year of minting (1976).
Reverse: Liberty Bell in front of the moon, country name, face value, two stars, and E pluribus unum (Out of many, one).

Dollar coin made of silver. Minted to commemorate 200th anniversary of United States Independence.

text: The adoption of the Declaration of Independence was dramatized in the 1969 Tony Award–winning musical 1776, and the 1972 movie of the same name, as well as in the 2008 television miniseries John Adams.[citation needed]

text: The Declaration was chosen to become the first digitized text (1971).[194]

text: Since 1976 (the United States Bicentennial), Trumbull's Declaration of Independence has been used on the back of the United States two-dollar bill.

text: In 1984, the Memorial to the 56 Signers of the Declaration was dedicated in Constitution Gardens on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., where the signatures of all the original signers are carved in stone with their names, places of residence, and occupations.

text: The new One World Trade Center building in New York City (2014) is 1776 feet high, to symbolize the year that the Declaration of Independence was signed.[195][196][197]


document_title: List of U.S. Open (golf) champions

question_text: who won the us open golf last year

question_tokens: who won the us open golf last year

text: List of U.S. Open (golf) champions

text: Champions[edit]

text: By year[edit]

text:
Key

(n/a)

Information not available

Tournament won in a playoff

*

Tournament won by an amateur

Tournament won by an amateur in a playoff

text:
U.S. Open champions

Year

Country

Champion

Course

Location

Total score

To par[a]

1895

 England

Horace Rawlins[b]

Newport Country Club

Newport, Rhode Island

173

n/a

1896

 Scotland

James Foulis[b]

Shinnecock Hills

Shinnecock Hills, New York

152

n/a

1897

 England

Joe Lloyd[b]

Chicago Golf Club

Wheaton, Illinois

162

n/a

1898

 Scotland

Fred Herd

Myopia Hunt Club

South Hamilton, Massachusetts

328

n/a

1899

 Scotland

Willie Smith

Baltimore Country Club

Lutherville, Maryland

315

n/a

1900

 Jersey

Harry Vardon

Chicago Golf Club

Wheaton, Illinois

313

n/a

1901

 Scotland

Willie Anderson[c]

Myopia Hunt Club

South Hamilton, Massachusetts

331

n/a

1902

 Scotland

Laurie Auchterlonie

Garden City Golf Club

Garden City, New York

307

n/a

1903

 Scotland

Willie Anderson[d]

Baltusrol Golf Club

Springfield, New Jersey

307

n/a

1904

 Scotland

Willie Anderson

Glen View Club

Golf, Illinois

303

n/a

1905

 Scotland

Willie Anderson

Myopia Hunt Club

South Hamilton, Massachusetts

314

n/a

1906

 Scotland

Alex Smith

Onwentsia Club

Lake Forest, Illinois

295

n/a

1907

 Scotland

Alec Ross

Philadelphia Cricket Club

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

302

n/a

1908

 Scotland

Fred McLeod[e]

Myopia Hunt Club

South Hamilton, Massachusetts

322

n/a

1909

 England

George Sargent

Englewood Golf Club

Englewood, New Jersey

290

+2

1910

 Scotland

Alex Smith[f]

Philadelphia Cricket Club

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

298

+6

1911

 United States

John McDermott[g]

Chicago Golf Club

Wheaton, Illinois

307

+3

1912

 United States

John McDermott

Country Club of Buffalo

Buffalo, New York

294

+6

1913

 United States

Francis Ouimet[h]

The Country Club

Brookline, Massachusetts

304

+12

1914

 United States

Walter Hagen

Midlothian Country Club

Midlothian, Illinois

290

+2

1915

 United States

Jerome Travers*

Baltusrol Golf Club

Springfield, New Jersey

297

+1

1916

 United States

Chick Evans*

The Minikahda Club

Minneapolis, Minnesota

286

−2

1917

&—

None[i]

&—

&—

&—

&—

1918

&—

None

&—

&—

&—

&—

1919

 United States

Walter Hagen[j]

Brae Burn Country Club

West Newton, Massachusetts

301

+17

1920

 Jersey

Ted Ray

Inverness Club

Toledo, Ohio

295

+7

1921

 England

Jim Barnes

Columbia Country Club

Chevy Chase, Maryland

289

+9

1922

 United States

Gene Sarazen

Skokie Country Club

Glencoe, Illinois

288

+8

1923

 United States

Bobby Jones[n][k]

Inwood Country Club

Inwood, New York

296

+8

1924

 England

Cyril Walker

Oakland Hills

Bloomfield Hills, Michigan

297

+9

1925

 Scotland

Willie Macfarlane[l]

Worcester Country Club

Worcester, Massachusetts

291

+7

1926

 United States

Bobby Jones*

Scioto Country Club

Columbus, Ohio

293

+5

1927

 United States

Tommy Armour[m]

Oakmont Country Club

Oakmont, Pennsylvania

301

+13

1928

 United States

Johnny Farrell[n]

Olympia Fields

Olympia Fields, Illinois

294

+10

1929

 United States

Bobby Jones[n][o]

Winged Foot Golf Club

Mamaroneck, New York

294

+6

1930

 United States

Bobby Jones*

Interlachen Country Club

Edina, Minnesota

287

−1

1931

 United States

Billy Burke[p]

Inverness Club

Toledo, Ohio

292

+8

1932

 United States

Gene Sarazen

Fresh Meadow Country Club

Great Neck, New York

286

+6

1933

 United States

Johnny Goodman*

North Shore Country Club

Glenview, Illinois

287

−1

1934

 United States

Olin Dutra

Merion Golf Club

Ardmore, Pennsylvania

293

+13

1935

 United States

Sam Parks, Jr.

Oakmont Country Club

Oakmont, Pennsylvania

299

+11

1936

 United States

Tony Manero

Baltusrol Golf Club

Springfield, New Jersey

282

−6

1937

 United States

Ralph Guldahl

Oakland Hills

Bloomfield Hills, Michigan

281

−7

1938

 United States

Ralph Guldahl

Cherry Hills

Cherry Hills Village, Colorado

284

E

1939

 United States

Byron Nelson[q]

Philadelphia Country Club

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

284

+8

1940

 United States

Lawson Little[r]

Canterbury Golf Club

Beachwood, Ohio

287

−1

1941

 United States

Craig Wood

Colonial Country Club

Fort Worth, Texas

284

+4

1942

&—

None[s]

&—

&—

&—

&—

1943

&—

None

&—

&—

&—

&—

1944

&—

None

&—

&—

&—

&—

1945

&—

None

&—

&—

&—

&—

1946

 United States

Lloyd Mangrum[t]

Canterbury Golf Club

Beachwood, Ohio

284

−4

1947

 United States

Lew Worsham[u]

St. Louis Country Club

St. Louis, Missouri

282

−2

1948

 United States

Ben Hogan

Riviera Country Club

Pacific Palisades, California

276

−8

1949

 United States

Cary Middlecoff

Medinah Country Club

Medinah, Illinois

286

+2

1950

 United States

Ben Hogan[v]

Merion Golf Club

Ardmore, Pennsylvania

287

+7

1951

 United States

Ben Hogan

Oakland Hills

Bloomfield Hills, Michigan

287

+7

1952

 United States

Julius Boros

Northwood Club

Dallas, Texas

281

+1

1953

 United States

Ben Hogan

Oakmont Country Club

Oakmont, Pennsylvania

283

−5

1954

 United States

Ed Furgol

Baltusrol Golf Club

Springfield, New Jersey

284

+4

1955

 United States

Jack Fleck[w]

Olympic Club

San Francisco, California

287

+7

1956

 United States

Cary Middlecoff

Oak Hill Country Club

Rochester, New York

281

+1

1957

 United States

Dick Mayer[x]

Inverness Club

Toledo, Ohio

282

+5

1958

 United States

Tommy Bolt

Southern Hills

Tulsa, Oklahoma

283

+3

1959

 United States

Billy Casper

Winged Foot Golf Club

Mamaroneck, New York

282

+2

1960

 United States

Arnold Palmer

Cherry Hills

Cherry Hills Village, Colorado

280

−4

1961

 United States

Gene Littler

Oakland Hills

Bloomfield Hills, Michigan

281

+1

1962

 United States

Jack Nicklaus[y]

Oakmont Country Club

Oakmont, Pennsylvania

283

−1

1963

 United States

Julius Boros[z]

The Country Club

Brookline, Massachusetts

293

+9

1964

 United States

Ken Venturi

Congressional Country Club

Bethesda, Maryland

278

−2

1965

 South Africa

Gary Player[aa]

Bellerive Country Club

St. Louis, Missouri

282

+2

1966

 United States

Billy Casper[bb]

Olympic Club

San Francisco, California

278

−2

1967

 United States

Jack Nicklaus

Baltusrol Golf Club

Springfield, New Jersey

275

−5

1968

 United States

Lee Trevino

Oak Hill Country Club

Rochester, New York

275

−5

1969

 United States

Orville Moody

Champions Golf Club

Houston, Texas

281

+1

1970

 England

Tony Jacklin

Hazeltine National Golf Club

Chaska, Minnesota

281

−7

1971

 United States

Lee Trevino[cc]

Merion Golf Club

Ardmore, Pennsylvania

280

E

1972

 United States

Jack Nicklaus

Pebble Beach

Pebble Beach, California

290

+2

1973

 United States

Johnny Miller

Oakmont Country Club

Oakmont, Pennsylvania

279

−5

1974

 United States

Hale Irwin

Winged Foot Golf Club

Mamaroneck, New York

287

+7

1975

 United States

Lou Graham[dd]

Medinah Country Club

Medinah, Illinois

287

+3

1976

 United States

Jerry Pate

Atlanta Athletic Club

Duluth, Georgia

277

−3

1977

 United States

Hubert Green

Southern Hills

Tulsa, Oklahoma

278

−2

1978

 United States

Andy North

Cherry Hills

Cherry Hills Village, Colorado

285

+1

1979

 United States

Hale Irwin

Inverness Club

Toledo, Ohio

284

E

1980

 United States

Jack Nicklaus

Baltusrol Golf Club

Springfield, New Jersey

272

−8

1981

 Australia

David Graham

Merion Golf Club

Ardmore, Pennsylvania

273

−7

1982

 United States

Tom Watson

Pebble Beach

Pebble Beach, California

282

−6

1983

 United States

Larry Nelson

Oakmont Country Club

Oakmont, Pennsylvania

280

−4

1984

 United States

Fuzzy Zoeller[ee]

Winged Foot Golf Club

Mamaroneck, New York

276

−4

1985

 United States

Andy North

Oakland Hills

Bloomfield Hills, Michigan

279

−1

1986

 United States

Raymond Floyd

Shinnecock Hills

Shinnecock Hills, New York

279

−1

1987

 United States

Scott Simpson

Olympic Club

San Francisco, California

277

−3

1988

 United States

Curtis Strange[ff]

The Country Club

Brookline, Massachusetts

278

−6

1989

 United States

Curtis Strange

Oak Hill Country Club

Rochester, New York

278

−2

1990

 United States

Hale Irwin[gg]

Medinah Country Club

Medinah, Illinois

280

−8

1991

 United States

Payne Stewart[hh]

Hazeltine National Golf Club

Chaska, Minnesota

282

−6

1992

 United States

Tom Kite

Pebble Beach

Pebble Beach, California

285

−3

1993

 United States

Lee Janzen

Baltusrol Golf Club

Springfield, New Jersey

272

−8

1994

 South Africa

Ernie Els[ii]

Oakmont Country Club

Oakmont, Pennsylvania

279

−5

1995

 United States

Corey Pavin

Shinnecock Hills

Shinnecock Hills, New York

280

E

1996

 United States

Steve Jones

Oakland Hills

Bloomfield Hills, Michigan

278

−2

1997

 South Africa

Ernie Els

Congressional Country Club

Bethesda, Maryland

276

−4

1998

 United States

Lee Janzen

Olympic Club

San Francisco, California

280

E

1999

 United States

Payne Stewart

Pinehurst Resort

Pinehurst, North Carolina

279

−1

2000

 United States

Tiger Woods

Pebble Beach

Pebble Beach, California

272

−12

2001

 South Africa

Retief Goosen[jj]

Southern Hills

Tulsa, Oklahoma

276

−4

2002

 United States

Tiger Woods

Bethpage Black

Farmingdale, New York

277

−3

2003

 United States

Jim Furyk

Olympia Fields

Olympia Fields, Illinois

272

−8

2004

 South Africa

Retief Goosen

Shinnecock Hills

Shinnecock Hills, New York

276

−4

2005

 New Zealand

Michael Campbell

Pinehurst Resort

Pinehurst, North Carolina

280

E

2006

 Australia

Geoff Ogilvy

Winged Foot Golf Club

Mamaroneck, New York

285

+5

2007

 Argentina

Ángel Cabrera

Oakmont Country Club

Oakmont, Pennsylvania

285

+5

2008

 United States

Tiger Woods[kk]

Torrey Pines

San Diego, California

283

−1

2009

 United States

Lucas Glover

Bethpage Black

Farmingdale, New York

276

−4

2010

 Northern Ireland

Graeme McDowell

Pebble Beach Golf Links

Pebble Beach, California

284

E

2011

 Northern Ireland

Rory McIlroy

Congressional Country Club

Bethesda, Maryland

268

−16

2012

 United States

Webb Simpson

Olympic Club

San Francisco, California

281

+1

2013

 England

Justin Rose

Merion Golf Club

Ardmore, Pennsylvania

281

+1

2014

 Germany

Martin Kaymer

Pinehurst Resort

Pinehurst, North Carolina

271

−9

2015

 United States

Jordan Spieth

Chambers Bay

University Place, Washington

275

−5

2016

 United States

Dustin Johnson

Oakmont Country Club

Oakmont, Pennsylvania

276

−4

2017

 United States

Brooks Koepka

Erin Hills

Erin, Wisconsin

272

−16

2018

 United States

Brooks Koepka

Shinnecock Hills

Shinnecock Hills, New York

281

+1

text: Multiple champions[edit]

text:
U.S. Open multiple champions

Golfer

Total

Years

 Willie Anderson (SCO)

4

1901, 1903, 1904, 1905

 Bobby Jones (a) (USA)

4

1923, 1926, 1929, 1930

 Ben Hogan (USA)

4

1948, 1950, 1951, 1953

 Jack Nicklaus (USA)

4

1962, 1967, 1972, 1980

 Hale Irwin (USA)

3

1974, 1979, 1990

 Tiger Woods (USA)

3

2000, 2002, 2008

 Alex Smith (SCO)

2

1906, 1910

 John McDermott (USA)

2

1911, 1912

 Walter Hagen (USA)

2

1914, 1919

 Gene Sarazen (USA)

2

1922, 1932

 Ralph Guldahl (USA)

2

1937, 1938

 Cary Middlecoff (USA)

2

1949, 1956

 Julius Boros (USA)

2

1952, 1963

 Billy Casper (USA)

2

1959, 1966

 Lee Trevino (USA)

2

1968, 1971

 Andy North (USA)

2

1978, 1985

 Curtis Strange (USA)

2

1988, 1989

 Ernie Els (RSA)

2

1994, 1997

 Lee Janzen (USA)

2

1993, 1998

 Payne Stewart (USA)

2

1991, 1999

 Retief Goosen (RSA)

2

2001, 2004

 Brooks Koepka (USA)

2

2017, 2018

text: Champions by nationality[edit]

text:
U.S. Open champions by nationality

Nationality

Wins

Winners

 United States

84

58

 Scotland

13

9

 England

7

7

 South Africa

5

3

 Jersey

2

2

 Australia

2

2

 Northern Ireland

2

2

 New Zealand

1

1

 Argentina

1

1

 Germany

1

1

text: Notes[edit]

text:
a  Par is a predetermined number of strokes that a golfer should require to complete a hole, a round (the sum of the total pars of the played holes), or a tournament (the sum of the total pars of each round). E stands for even, which means the tournament was completed in the predetermined number of strokes.
b  The Championship was played over 36 holes.
c  Willie Anderson won in a playoff against Alex Smith.
d  Willie Anderson won in a playoff against David Brown.
e  Fred McLeod won in a playoff against Willie Smith.
f  Alex Smith won in a playoff against John McDermott and Macdonald Smith.
g  John McDermott won in a playoff against Mike Brady and George Simpson.
h  Francis Ouimet won in a playoff against Harry Vardon and Ted Ray.
i  The U.S. Open was not held from 1917 to 1918 because of World War I.
j  Walter Hagen won in a playoff against Mike Brady.
k  Bobby Jones won in a playoff against Bobby Cruickshank.
l  Willie Macfarlane won in a playoff against Bobby Jones.
m  Tommy Armour won in a playoff against Harry Cooper.
n  Johnny Farrell won in a playoff against Bobby Jones.
o  Bobby Jones won in a playoff against Al Espinosa.
p  Billy Burke won in a playoff against George von Elm.
q  Byron Nelson won in a playoff against Craig Wood and Denny Shute.
r  Lawson Little won in a playoff against Gene Sarazen.
s  The U.S. Open was not held from 1942 to 1945 because of World War II.
t  Lloyd Mangrum won in a playoff against Vic Ghezzi and Byron Nelson.
u  Lew Worsham won in a playoff against Sam Snead.
v  Ben Hogan won in a playoff against Lloyd Mangrum and George Fazio.
w  Jack Fleck won in a playoff against Ben Hogan.
x  Dick Mayer won in a playoff against Cary Middlecoff.
y  Jack Nicklaus won in a playoff against Arnold Palmer.
z  Julius Boros won in a playoff against Jacky Cupit and Arnold Palmer.
aa  Gary Player won in a playoff against Kel Nagle.
bb  Billy Casper won in a playoff against Arnold Palmer.
cc  Lee Trevino won in a playoff against Jack Nicklaus.
dd  Lou Graham won in a playoff against John Mahaffey.
ee  Fuzzy Zoeller won in a playoff against Greg Norman.
ff  Curtis Strange won in a playoff against Nick Faldo.
gg  Hale Irwin won in a playoff against Mike Donald.
hh  Payne Stewart won in a playoff against Scott Simpson.
ii  Ernie Els won in a playoff against Loren Roberts and Colin Montgomerie.
jj  Retief Goosen won in a playoff against Mark Brooks.
kk  Tiger Woods won in a playoff against Rocco Mediate.

tag: ul


document_title: 2017–18 NCAA football bowl games

question_text: who plays college football on new year's day

question_tokens: who plays college football on new year 's day

text: 2017–18 NCAA football bowl games

text: Schedule[edit]

text: The schedule for the 2017–18 bowl games is below. All times are EST (UTC−5).[4][5]

text: College Football Playoff and Championship Game[edit]

text: The College Football Playoff system was used to determine a national champion of Division I FBS college football. A 13-member committee of experts ranked the top 25 teams in the nation after each of the last seven weeks of the 2017 season. The top four teams in the final ranking played a single-elimination semifinal round, with the winners advancing to the National Championship game.

text: The semifinal games were the Rose Bowl and the Sugar Bowl. Both were played on New Year's Day, as part of a yearly rotation of three pairs of six bowls, commonly referred to as the CFP New Year's Six bowl games. Their winners advanced to the 2018 College Football Playoff National Championship at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta, Georgia on January 8, 2018.

text:
Semifinals

Championship

January 1 – Sugar Bowl

Mercedes-Benz Superdome, New Orleans

  1
  Clemson
6

  4
  Alabama
24

January 8 – National Championship

Mercedes-Benz Stadium, Atlanta

  4
  Alabama (OT)
26

January 1 – Rose Bowl

Rose Bowl, Pasadena

  3
  Georgia
23

  2
  Oklahoma
48

  3
  Georgia (2OT)
54

text:
view
talk
edit

text:
Date
Game
Site
Teams
Affiliations
Results

Dec 29
Goodyear Cotton Bowl Classic
AT&T Stadium
Arlington, Texas
8:30 pm
#5 Ohio State Buckeyes (11–2)
#8 USC Trojans (11–2)
Big Ten
Pac-12
Ohio State 24
USC 7

Dec 30
PlayStation Fiesta Bowl
University of Phoenix Stadium
Glendale, Arizona
4:00 pm
#9 Penn State Nittany Lions (10–2)
#11 Washington Huskies (10–2)
Big Ten
Pac-12
Penn State 35
Washington 28

Capital One Orange Bowl
Hard Rock Stadium
Miami Gardens, Florida
8:00 pm
#6 Wisconsin Badgers (12–1)
#10 Miami Hurricanes (10–2)
Big Ten
ACC
Wisconsin 34
Miami 24

Jan 1
Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl
Mercedes-Benz Stadium
Atlanta, Georgia
12:30 pm
#12 UCF Knights (12–0)
#7 Auburn Tigers (10–3)
American
SEC
UCF 34
Auburn 27

Rose Bowl Game presented by Northwestern Mutual
(Playoff Semifinal Game)

Rose Bowl
Pasadena, California
5:00 pm
#3 Georgia Bulldogs (12–1)
#2 Oklahoma Sooners (12–1)
SEC
Big 12
Georgia 54
Oklahoma 48 (2OT)

Allstate Sugar Bowl
(Playoff Semifinal Game)

Mercedes-Benz Superdome
New Orleans, Louisiana
8:45 pm
#4 Alabama Crimson Tide (11–1)
#1 Clemson Tigers (12–1)
SEC
ACC
Alabama 24
Clemson 6

Jan 8
College Football Playoff National Championship
(Rose Bowl winner vs. Sugar Bowl winner)

Mercedes-Benz Stadium
Atlanta, Georgia
8:00 pm
#4 Alabama Crimson Tide (12-1)
#3 Georgia Bulldogs (13–1)
SEC
SEC
Alabama 26
Georgia 23 (OT)

text: Non-CFP bowl games[edit]

text: On April 11, 2016, the NCAA announced a freeze on new bowl games until after the 2019 season. While bowl games had been the purview of only the very best teams for nearly a century, the NCAA had to lower its postseason eligibility criteria repeatedly (2006, 2009, 2010, 2012 and 2013), eventually allowing teams with losing seasons (5–7) to participate in bowls due to there being not enough bowl-eligible teams, while also having to allow teams from the same conference to meet in the 2015 Arizona Bowl due to the lack of eligible teams to meet its other tie-ins.[6][7][8] For the 2017–18 bowl season, 62% of the 130 teams playing in Division I FBS were deemed eligible to participate in a bowl game, with 60% actually receiving invites to fill the 78 available slots.

text: For the 2017–18 bowl season, changes from the prior season's bowl games are the Frisco Bowl replacing the Miami Beach Bowl, and discontinuation of the Poinsettia Bowl. What was the Russell Athletic Bowl is now the Camping World Bowl, due to a sponsorship change and the St. Petersburg Bowl has been renamed as the Gasparilla Bowl, after mythical St. Petersburg area pirate José Gaspar.

text:
Date
Game
Site
Television
Radio
Teams
Affiliations
Results

Dec 16
R+L Carriers New Orleans Bowl
Mercedes-Benz Superdome
New Orleans, Louisiana
1:00 pm
ESPN
ESPN Radio
Troy Trojans (10–2)
North Texas Mean Green (9–4)
Sun Belt
C–USA
Troy 50
North Texas 30

AutoNation Cure Bowl
Camping World Stadium
Orlando, Florida
2:30 pm
CBSSN
Touchdown Radio
Georgia State Panthers (6–5)
Western Kentucky Hilltoppers (6–6)
Sun Belt
C-USA
Georgia State 27
Western Kentucky 17

Las Vegas Bowl
Sam Boyd Stadium
Las Vegas, Nevada
3:30 pm
ABC
Sports USA
#25 Boise State Broncos (10–3)
Oregon Ducks (7–5)
Mountain West
Pac–12
Boise State 38
Oregon 28

Gildan New Mexico Bowl
Dreamstyle Stadium
Albuquerque, New Mexico
4:30 pm
ESPN
ESPN Radio
Marshall Thundering Herd (7–5)
Colorado State Rams (7–5)
C–USA
Mountain West
Marshall 31
Colorado State 28

Raycom Media Camellia Bowl
Cramton Bowl
Montgomery, Alabama
8:00 pm
ESPN
Middle Tennessee Blue Raiders (6–6)
Arkansas State Red Wolves (7–4)
C–USA
Sun Belt
Middle Tennessee 35
Arkansas State 30

Dec 19
Cheribundi Tart Cherry Boca Raton Bowl
FAU Stadium
Boca Raton, Florida
7:00 pm
ESPN
Florida Atlantic Owls (10–3)
Akron Zips (7–6)
C–USA
MAC
Florida Atlantic 50
Akron 3

Dec 20
DXL Frisco Bowl
Toyota Stadium
Frisco, Texas
8:00 pm
ESPN
RedVoice, LLC
Louisiana Tech Bulldogs (6–6)
SMU Mustangs (7–5)
C–USA
American
Louisiana Tech 51
SMU 10

Dec 21
Bad Boy Mowers Gasparilla Bowl
Tropicana Field
St. Petersburg, Florida
8:00 pm
ESPN
Temple Owls (6–6)
FIU Panthers (8–4)
American
C–USA
Temple 28
FIU 3

Dec 22
Bahamas Bowl
Thomas Robinson Stadium
Nassau, Bahamas
12:30 pm
ESPN
Ohio Bobcats (8–4)
UAB Blazers (8–4)
MAC
C–USA
Ohio 41
UAB 6

Famous Idaho Potato Bowl
Albertsons Stadium
Boise, Idaho
4:00 pm
ESPN
Wyoming Cowboys (7–5)
Central Michigan Chippewas (8–4)
Mountain West
MAC
Wyoming 37
Central Michigan 14

Dec 23
Birmingham Bowl
Legion Field
Birmingham, Alabama
12:00 pm
ESPN
South Florida Bulls (9–2)
Texas Tech Red Raiders (6–6)
American
Big 12
South Florida 38
Texas Tech 34

Lockheed Martin Armed Forces Bowl
Amon G. Carter Stadium
Fort Worth, Texas
3:30 pm
ESPN
Army Black Knights (9–3)
San Diego State Aztecs (10–2)
Independents
Mountain West
Army 42
San Diego State 35

Dollar General Bowl
Ladd–Peebles Stadium
Mobile, Alabama
7:00 pm
ESPN
Nevada SN
Appalachian State Mountaineers (8–4)
Toledo Rockets (11–2)
Sun Belt
MAC
Appalachian State 34
Toledo 0

Dec 24
Hawaii Bowl
Aloha Stadium
Honolulu, Hawaii
8:30 pm
ESPN
ESPN Radio
Fresno State Bulldogs (9–4)
Houston Cougars (7–4)
Mountain West
American
Fresno State 33
Houston 27

Dec 26
Zaxby's Heart of Dallas Bowl
Cotton Bowl Stadium
Dallas, Texas
1:00 pm
ESPN
RedVoice, LLC
Utah Utes (6–6)
West Virginia Mountaineers (7–5)
Pac-12
Big 12
Utah 30
West Virginia 14

Quick Lane Bowl
Ford Field
Detroit, Michigan
5:15 pm
ESPN
WJR
Duke Blue Devils (6–6)
Northern Illinois Huskies (8–4)
ACC
MAC
Duke 36
Northern Illinois 14

Cactus Bowl
Chase Field
Phoenix, Arizona
9:00 pm
ESPN
ESPN Radio
Kansas State Wildcats (7–5)
UCLA Bruins (6–6)
Big 12
Pac-12
Kansas State 35
UCLA 17

Dec 27
Walk-On's Independence Bowl
Independence Stadium
Shreveport, Louisiana
1:30 pm
ESPN
Sports USA
Florida State Seminoles (6–6)
Southern Miss Golden Eagles (8–4)
ACC
C–USA
Florida State 42
Southern Miss 13

New Era Pinstripe Bowl
Yankee Stadium
Bronx, New York
5:15 pm
ESPN
ESPN Radio
Iowa Hawkeyes (7–5)
Boston College Eagles (7–5)
Big Ten
ACC
Iowa 27
Boston College 20

Foster Farms Bowl
Levi's Stadium
Santa Clara, California
8:30 pm
Fox
Fox Sports Radio
Purdue Boilermakers (6–6)
Arizona Wildcats (7–5)
Big Ten
Pac-12
Purdue 38
Arizona 35

Academy Sports + Outdoors Texas Bowl
NRG Stadium
Houston, Texas
9:00 pm
ESPN
ESPN Radio
Texas Longhorns (6–6)
Missouri Tigers (7–5)
Big 12
SEC
Texas 33
Missouri 16

Dec 28
Military Bowl presented by Northrop Grumman
Navy–Marine Corps Memorial Stadium
Annapolis, Maryland
1:30 pm
ESPN
ESPN Radio
Navy Midshipmen (6–6)
Virginia Cavaliers (6–6)
American
ACC
Navy 49
Virginia 7

Camping World Bowl
Camping World Stadium
Orlando, Florida
5:15 pm
ESPN
#19 Oklahoma State Cowboys (9–3)
#22 Virginia Tech Hokies (9–3)
Big 12
ACC
Oklahoma State 30
Virginia Tech 21

Valero Alamo Bowl
Alamodome
San Antonio, Texas
9:00 pm
ESPN
#15 TCU Horned Frogs (10–3)
#13 Stanford Cardinal (9–4)
Big 12
Pac-12
TCU 39
Stanford 37

San Diego County Credit Union Holiday Bowl
SDCCU Stadium
San Diego, California
9:00 pm
FS1
Fox Sports Radio
#16 Michigan State Spartans (9–3)
#18 Washington State Cougars (9–3)
Big Ten
Pac-12
Michigan State 42
Washington State 17

Dec 29
Belk Bowl
Bank of America Stadium
Charlotte, North Carolina
1:00 pm
ESPN
ESPN Radio
Wake Forest Demon Deacons (7–5)
Texas A&M Aggies (7–5)
ACC
SEC
Wake Forest 55
Texas A&M 52

Hyundai Sun Bowl
Sun Bowl Stadium
El Paso, Texas
3:00 pm
CBS
Sports USA
#24 NC State Wolfpack (8–4)
Arizona State Sun Devils (7–5)
ACC
Pac-12
NC State 52
Arizona State 31

Franklin American Mortgage Music City Bowl
Nissan Stadium
Nashville, Tennessee
4:30 pm
ESPN
ESPN Radio
#21 Northwestern Wildcats (9–3)
Kentucky Wildcats (7–5)
Big Ten
SEC
Northwestern 24
Kentucky 23

Nova Home Loans Arizona Bowl
Arizona Stadium
Tucson, Arizona
5:30 pm
CBSSN

New Mexico State Aggies (6–6)
Utah State Aggies (6–6)
Sun Belt
Mountain West
New Mexico State 26
Utah State 20 (OT)

Dec 30
TaxSlayer Bowl
EverBank Field
Jacksonville, Florida
12:00 pm
ESPN
Touchdown Radio
#23 Mississippi State Bulldogs (8–4)
Louisville Cardinals (8–4)
SEC
ACC
Mississippi State 31
Louisville 27

AutoZone Liberty Bowl
Liberty Bowl
Memphis, Tennessee
12:30 pm
ABC
ESPN Radio
Iowa State Cyclones (7–5)
#20 Memphis Tigers (10–2)
Big 12
American
Iowa State 21
Memphis 20

Jan 1
Outback Bowl
Raymond James Stadium
Tampa, Florida
12:00 pm
ESPN2
Sports USA
South Carolina Gamecocks (8–4)
Michigan Wolverines (8–4)
SEC
Big Ten
South Carolina 26
Michigan 19

Citrus Bowl presented by Overton's
Camping World Stadium
Orlando, Florida
1:00 pm
ABC
ESPN Radio
#14 Notre Dame Fighting Irish (9–3)
#17 LSU Tigers (9–3)
Independents
SEC
Notre Dame 21
LSU 17

text: All-star games[edit]

text:
Date
Game
Site
Television
Participants
Results

Jan 20
East–West Shrine Game
Tropicana Field
St. Petersburg, Florida
3:00 pm
NFL Network
East Team
West Team
West 14
East 10

NFLPA Collegiate Bowl
Rose Bowl
Pasadena, California
4:00 pm
FS1
American Team
National Team
National 23
American 0

Jan 27
Senior Bowl
Ladd–Peebles Stadium
Mobile, Alabama
2:30 pm
NFL Network
North Team
South Team
South 45
North 16

text: Selection of the teams[edit]

text: CFP top 25 teams[edit]

text: On December 3, 2017, the College Football Playoff selection committee announced their final team rankings for the year.[9]

text: In the fourth year of the College Football Playoff era, this was the first time that two of the four semifinalists (Georgia and Alabama) were from the same conference.

text:
Rank
Team
W–L
Conference and standing
Bowl game

1

Clemson Tigers

12–1

ACC champions
Sugar Bowl

2

Oklahoma Sooners

12–1

Big 12 champions
Rose Bowl

3

Georgia Bulldogs

12–1

SEC champions
Rose Bowl

4

Alabama Crimson Tide

11–1

SEC West Division co-champions
Sugar Bowl

5

Ohio State Buckeyes

11–2

Big Ten champions
Cotton Bowl

6

Wisconsin Badgers

12–1

Big Ten West Division champions
Orange Bowl

7

Auburn Tigers

10–3

SEC West Division co-champions
Peach Bowl

8

USC Trojans

11–2

Pac-12 champions
Cotton Bowl

9

Penn State Nittany Lions

10–2

Big Ten East Division second place (tie)
Fiesta Bowl

10

Miami Hurricanes

10–2

ACC Coastal Division champions
Orange Bowl

11

Washington Huskies

10–2

Pac-12 North Division co-champions
Fiesta Bowl

12

UCF Knights

12–0

AAC champions
Peach Bowl

13

Stanford Cardinal

9–4

Pac-12 North Division co-champions
Alamo Bowl

14

Notre Dame Fighting Irish

9–3

Independent
Citrus Bowl

15

TCU Horned Frogs

10–3

Big 12 second place
Alamo Bowl

16

Michigan State Spartans

9–3

Big Ten East Division second place (tie)
Holiday Bowl

17

LSU Tigers

9–3

SEC West Division third place
Citrus Bowl

18

Washington State Cougars

9–3

Pac-12 North Division third place
Holiday Bowl

19

Oklahoma State Cowboys

9–3

Big 12 third place
Camping World Bowl

20

Memphis Tigers

10–2

AAC West Division champions
Liberty Bowl

21

Northwestern Wildcats

9–3

Big Ten West Division second place
Music City Bowl

22

Virginia Tech Hokies

9–3

ACC Coastal Division second place
Camping World Bowl

23

Mississippi State Bulldogs

8–4

SEC West Division fourth place (tie)
TaxSlayer Bowl

24

NC State Wolfpack

8–4

ACC Atlantic Division second place
Sun Bowl

25

Boise State Broncos

10–3

MWC champions
Las Vegas Bowl

text: Bowl-eligible teams[edit]

text:
American (7): Houston, Memphis, Navy, SMU, South Florida, Temple, UCF
ACC (10): Boston College, Clemson, Duke, Florida State, Louisville, Miami, NC State, Virginia, Virginia Tech, Wake Forest
Big Ten (8): Iowa, Michigan, Michigan State, Northwestern, Ohio State, Penn State, Purdue, Wisconsin
Big 12 (8): Iowa State, Kansas State, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, TCU, Texas, Texas Tech, West Virginia
C-USA (10): FIU, Florida Atlantic, Louisiana Tech, Marshall, Middle Tennessee, North Texas, Southern Miss, UAB, UTSA, Western Kentucky
Independent (2): Army, Notre Dame
MAC (7): Akron, Buffalo, Central Michigan, Northern Illinois, Ohio, Toledo, Western Michigan
Mountain West (6): Boise State, Colorado State, Fresno State, San Diego State, Utah State, Wyoming
Pac-12 (9): Arizona, Arizona State, Oregon, Stanford, UCLA, USC, Utah, Washington, Washington State
SEC (9): Alabama, Auburn, Georgia, Kentucky, LSU, Mississippi State, Missouri, South Carolina, Texas A&M
Sun Belt (5): Appalachian State, Arkansas State, Georgia State, New Mexico State, Troy

text: Number of teams going to bowl games: 78

text: Number of bowl-eligible teams: 81

text: In mid-December multiple media sources reported that Florida State might not have met its bowl eligibility requirements. The team had a record of 6–6, with one of the wins – their 77–6 victory over Delaware State – against an FCS team. For such a game to count towards bowl eligibility, the FCS opponent must have used at least 90 percent of its allotted scholarships, and it was not clear that Delaware State had done so.[10] But a few days later the Florida State administration issued a statement saying that Delaware State did in fact meet that threshold, once non-athletic scholarship funds were factored in.[11]

text: Bowl-eligible teams that did not receive a berth[edit]

text: As there are more bowl-eligible teams than bowl berths, three bowl-eligible teams did not receive a bowl berth:

text:
Buffalo (6–6)
UTSA (6–5)
Western Michigan (6–6)

text: Bowl-ineligible teams[edit]

text:
American (5): Cincinnati, Connecticut, East Carolina, Tulane, Tulsa
ACC (4): Georgia Tech, North Carolina, Pittsburgh, Syracuse
Big Ten (6): Illinois, Indiana, Maryland, Minnesota, Nebraska, Rutgers
Big 12 (2): Baylor, Kansas
C-USA (4): Charlotte, Old Dominion, Rice, UTEP
Independent (2): BYU, Massachusetts
MAC (5): Ball State, Bowling Green, Eastern Michigan, Kent State, Miami (OH)
Mountain West (6): Air Force, Hawaii, Nevada, New Mexico, San Jose State, UNLV
Pac-12 (3): California, Colorado, Oregon State
SEC (5): Arkansas, Florida, Ole Miss[a], Tennessee, Vanderbilt
Sun Belt (7): Coastal Carolina[b], Georgia Southern, Idaho, Louisiana–Lafayette, Louisiana–Monroe, South Alabama, Texas State

text:
Jump up ^ Despite winning six games for a .500 (6–6) regular-season record, Ole Miss is bowl-ineligible due to a self-imposed bowl ban.[12]
Jump up ^ Coastal Carolina is in the second year of its two-year transition from FCS to FBS and is bowl-ineligible due to NCAA regulations, but would have been ineligible based on record in any case.

tag: ol

text: Number of bowl-ineligible teams: 49