On July 4, 1776, our founders declared independence from a king.
In 2025, we must declare independence from a would-be one.
What follows is a document in their spirit—modeled after Jefferson’s original, updated for the autocracy now threatening to swallow our republic.
Because when the Constitution is treated as optional, when the rule of law bends to the whims of one man, and when democracy becomes performance art for strongmen, it’s time to speak plainly.
The Unanimous Declaration of the People of the United States of America, in Defense of Liberty and Democracy
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for a people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with a would-be tyrant, and to reclaim the sacred principles of democracy, decency, and truth, a decent respect to the opinions of humankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all people are created equal, that they are endowed not by autocrats but by their humanity with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Liberty, Justice, and the Right to live free of authoritarian rule. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among People, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any Leader becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to oppose him, to reject his grasp for power, and to seek new leadership, laying its foundation on principles of democracy and accountability.
Prudence indeed will dictate that democracies long established should not be discarded for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that humanity is more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the form 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 a would-be ruler, and to provide new guards for their future security.
Such has been the patient suffering of these United States under the aspiring despotism of Donald J. Trump, whose history of repeated injuries and usurpations all have the direct object of establishing an elected autocracy over these free States. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world:
He has sought to overturn the results of a free and fair election, inciting violence and undermining the peaceful transfer of power.
He has corrupted the institutions of justice, demanding loyalty not to the law, but to himself.
He has praised dictators and strongmen, while denigrating allies and democratic partners.
He has attacked the free press, branding truth as “fake” and the press as “enemy of the people.”
He has fomented division by appealing to the basest instincts of fear, racism, and hatred.
He has turned the instruments of government—law enforcement, immigration, the military—into tools for personal retribution and spectacle.
He has sought to criminalize dissent, punish whistleblowers, and retaliate against those who speak truth to power.
He has weaponized the pardon power to protect loyalists and undermine the rule of law.
He has violated the Emoluments Clause, enriching himself at the public’s expense.
He has appointed unqualified ideologues to the bench to secure rulings that favor power over people.
He has declared his intention to use the machinery of government to prosecute his political enemies.
He has shown contempt for the Constitution, the separation of powers, and the will of the people.
In every stage of these oppressions, we have petitioned for redress in the most humble terms: our protests have been met with tear gas; our votes, with lawsuits; our voices, with threats. A leader whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a tyrant is unfit to govern a free people.
We have warned those who support him—his enablers in Congress, his justifiers in media, and his apologists in the courts—that their silence is complicity. They have been deaf to the voice of principle and duty.
Therefore, we, the People of the United States of America, appealing to the better angels of our history, do solemnly publish and declare:
That Donald J. Trump is unworthy of the office of the Presidency;
That we are absolved from any moral, civic, or patriotic allegiance to his rule;
That we will oppose, resist, and reject his descent into autocracy.
And that as free citizens we shall resist all attempts to undermine our democracy, suppress our voices, or concentrate power in the hands of one man.
And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the strength of our convictions and the power of our votes, we mutually pledge to each other our voices, our ballots, and our sacred commitment to liberty.
If this Declaration speaks for you, let your voice be heard.
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As I see it, the grievances are indeed real. However, the document, as it stands, lacks the stature to serve as a national constitution – if nothing else, because it is designed around the perspective of one man.
Particularly with the advent of marks, Ingles, Lennon, Trotsky, and their successor, I believe that other themes should be addressed within this constitution.
At the very least, the Democratic control of production for the social need of all, and not the insatiable greed of a few, internationalism and anti-imperialism [including prohibition of war, as standing policy], worker rights and social rights [as a guard against fascism], environmental sustainability, a path to social transformation, and highly participatory democracy by the empowerment of local elections in every community, neighborhood and workplace to establish rank in file committees, governed by workers themselves.
This confronts the issue of social class, which has contradicted development at every level of US history since the first to the present day. Without addressing class interests, I really cannot see how a new constitution would avoid the fate of the existing one.