the Congress should 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....
This Virginia resolution was a declaration of independence. Read the following day to cheering troops in Williamsburg, the resolution prompted the troops to hoist the Continental Union flag and to drink toasts to "the American Independent States", "the Grand Congress", and to "General Washington".
At the same time the convention appointed a committee led by George Mason to draw up a constitution and a declaration of rights for the people of the new Commonwealth of Virginia. Mason's famous Declaration of Rights was adopted on June 12, 1776, and the Constitution of Virginia was adopted on June 28, 1776.
Virginia was a free and independent state. It would be seven long years, however, before Great Britain accepted this as fact.
Part IV:
The Commonwealth of Virginia
Declaration of Rights
The two greatest documents of the Revolution came from the pens of Virginians George Mason and Thomas Jefferson. Political scientist Clinton Rossiter notes, "The declaration of rights in 1776 remain America's most "We hold these
truths to be
self-evident...." notable contribution to universal political thought. Through these eloquent statements the rights-of-man political theory became political reality."[33 ]