Notes From Underground (#10, Appendix): No Kings! And No Dictators!
The Declaration of Independence: Updated (Full Version)
Happy 4th of July everyone!
In honor of this Day, I would like to send out an updated version of the Declaration of Independence.
Sadly, as you will see, I have changed very little of the original document. Indeed, I have hardly deleted a single paragraph. Sometimes—even where I have changed it—I have changed it to reflect an even greater threat to our form of government than the one we faced almost 250 years ago.
Feel free to “sign on” in the comments section below. And spread the word—even to your Trump-supporting fellow Americans, if possible.
For the Trump supporters, I have a challenge for you: without looking at the original, tell me what you think I changed. If you think you got them all right, reply in the comment section below:
On Substack, July 4, 2025
The unanimous Declaration of the people of the 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 their Government, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which lead them to separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men and women 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 Mankind, 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.
Prudence and common sense, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for any ordinary cause. Indeed, all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer—while evils can still be patiently suffered—than to right themselves by abolishing the forms of government that they are used to living under.
But, when a long train of abuses and usurpations, consistently pursuing one common Object, reveals a design to reduce them under absolute Tyranny, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.
--Such has been the patient sufferance of these United States, and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government.
The history of the present self-anointed King of these United States is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Power over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws of our Legislature, the most wholesome and necessary for the Public Good, by refusing to distribute Government Funds that he has no right to withhold.
He has tried to pass Legislation that forbids our Governors and State Legislatures from passing Laws of immediate and pressing importance, including regulations on new and emerging Industries, regulations meant to protect the Common Good against rapacious Greed and further Abuses.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, and uncomfortable, to pass legislation unpopular both with the people and unpopular within the halls of the Legislature itself. Moreover, he has taken such measures for the sole purpose of fatiguing the Legislature into compliance with his measures.
He has called for the arrest of his political enemies repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has jailed his political enemies, and named them threats merely for exercising their sacred right to free speech and to criticize their Government.
He has endeavoured to prevent and terrorize the population—and particularly the Hispanic and Latino population—of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; attacking Birthright Citizenship; and so launching an unheard-of attack on those we once saw as our fellow Americans.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice and of proper accountability; by refusing to allow legislators to inspect possible abuses at holding centers; and by openly defying court orders, including from the highest Court in the land.
He has attempted to make Judges dependent on his Will alone, through bills meant to limit the Judges’s ability to hold his Administration accountable for any and all abuses of power—no matter how severe.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, destroyed others that he had no right to destroy, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass and terrorize law-abiding Inhabitants.
He has further erected a multitude of New Prisons, which bear a greater resemblance to medieval castles surrounded by moats than to prisons of the modern age.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies of Law Enforcement Agents, masked Secret Police enforcing his will without the Consent of our Legislatures. Moreover, he has recently passed Legislation to greatly expand that Standing Army’s Reign of Terror—even beyond the Budgets of the Militaries of the most vicious Dictators and Despots.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power. Pretending to preserve order, he has instead designed to incite riots to distract from personal humiliations.
He has established a Conspiracy with other Leaders to subject people under our jurisdiction to jurisdictions foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Justice.
He has aided one of these Leaders in covering up their role in cooperating with dangerous Criminal Gangs and Marauders which have terrorized our Peoples. In furtherance of this cover-up, he has allowed criminal gang leaders to escape our own System of Justice.
He has used his political influence to fund a campaign of death, destruction, and annihilation with our Taxpayer Dollars, all to help a political Friend of his, who just so happens to be facing Criminal Charges in his own Country.
He has aided Foreign Despots and Dictators by withholding further funding for Nations fighting a foreign Tyranny dangerous to us all, an act that better helps him establish his own Tyranny here at Home.
For stationing large bodies of Armed Troops within our Local Communities:
For protecting them from punishment for any abuses which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Tariffs on us without our Legislature’s Consent:
For depriving our Residents, in an alarming number of cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
For transporting our Residents beyond Seas, to be jailed in Foreign Countries with no regard for the common Rights of Mankind.
For altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments, and the Checks and Balances that preserve our Government and Our Liberties.
He has plundered our Budget, ravaged our Social Services, stolen our Government’s Funds for Expensive Personal Gifts from foreigners and foreign Nations, and destroyed the livelihoods of our people by enslaving them to our mounting Debt.
He is at this time transferring large numbers of Funds to his Rich Friends, to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun, with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in our History.
He has attempted to incite violence, so that he in turn can engage in violence against us all.
He has endeavored to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Billionaire Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes, conditions, and economic classes except their own.
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.
Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Tyrannical Government. We have warned them from time to time of attempts 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.
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 this Nation, solemnly publish and declare, That these United States are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the Current Administration, and that all political connection between them and that Administration, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to protect the rights of their citizens from Abuses foreign to their form of government.
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.
Signed,
DAVID SALZILLO JR.
(“In the name of democracy, let us all unite!”)