APS Museum presents These Truths: The Declarations of Independence

It’s a broadside printed on November 1, 1775 by a Philadelphia Loyalist: an official notice to the grumbling colonists that King George was onto them.

Turns out a declaration from the King was really what got the whole beef rolling. In this printing, the King informs the unruly colonies that he considers them in “open and avowed rebellion” against the crown.

He says all British citizens are bound by law to aid in suppressing this rebellion, but more than that, his irritable tract decrees that any royal subject found to be corresponding with anyone “now in open arms or rebellion against our government” in North America must be reported to the government and punished.

Define rebellion, Your Majesty

The Continental Congress fired off a response in December 1775. It’s a “who, me?” masterclass in righteous indignation.

Congress claims no “allegiance” to Parliament, but declares that their words and conduct have always been consistent with allegiance to the King (pretty rich, considering all the grievances they would publish that summer).

“We oppose the claim of and exercise of unconstitutional powers, to which neither the Crown or Parliament were ever entitled,” they argue, insisting that everyone derives their inheritance, rights, and duties from the British Constitution, and “we cannot violate the latter by defending the former.” Plus, “we observe … that ‘rebellion’ is a term undefined and unknown in the law.”

“Let us suppose, for a moment, that some persons in the colonies are in rebellion,” Congress continues (perhaps the most mealymouthed statement of the entire Revolution). If a loyal Brit gets a letter from a testy colonist, what’s the legal standard for determining whether the colonist is indeed a rebel? And what if that Brit took up the correspondence in order to beg the colonist to knock it off with the treason? And, anyway, “by what law does a correspondence with a criminal transfer or communicate his guilt?” If you go through with this, Congress warns the King, we’ll likewise punish anyone who supports or abets “the system of ministerial oppression.”

Despite flowery overtones of peace from the colonists (definitely protesting a little too much), I can’t imagine either party was too surprised when war broke out seven months later.

Before the ink was dry

These Truths, which surveys the first 50 years of our Declaration and how it evolved in the public mind, is notable for being “likely the largest public display of first and early Declarations ever mounted in a single location,” according to APS. There’s John Dunlap’s July 4, 1776 broadside, mass-produced at the request of Congress for public display and readings (like the one on July 8 a stone’s throw from this exhibition). Two and a half centuries later, smudged letters at the folds betray the printer’s rush to get the news out before the ink was dry.

This surprisingly bite-sized show is installed in a single expeditious loop on the ground-floor gallery of APS. The 1775 missives between the King and colonists are a fascinating window on the development of the Declaration, alongside documents fretting over the potential role of southern enslavers (that one from George Washington himself) and Indigenous tribes in the brewing war.

Killing Jefferson’s darlings

There’s a handwritten note (June 21, 1776) from Thomas Jefferson to Benjamin Franklin, who was apparently not feeling well enough to go into the office that day. Jefferson enclosed a copy of his current draft of the Declaration, asking “will Doct. Franklyn be so good as to peruse it & suggest such alterations as his more enlarged view of the subject will dictate?” There’s no substitute for seeing Jefferson’s small, neat, loopy cursive in person (and his request will warm the cockles of any editor’s heart).

These Truths also boasts a large four-page “fair copy” of the Declaration in Jefferson’s own hand which he dispatched to Richard Henry Lee and Arthur Lee on July 8, 1776. Jefferson was mad that Congress forced him to kill so many of his darlings; his text was cut by one quarter to keep the whole thing to about 1300 words. You can see the Lees’ handwritten notes in the margins. Jefferson was sulking because his fellow Fathers cut out a passage criticizing the King for introducing the slave trade to the Americas (an odd sticking point for Jefferson, himself an enslaver). The point was ruled too divisive to mention in the final document.

From politics to sacred text

The show traces the evolution of the Declaration “from a political document into a sacred national text” in the surge of nationalism that followed the War of 1812. It took on new importance in public and private life. Publisher Benjamin Owen Tyler’s 1818 copperplate engraving is the Declaration’s first facsimile, featuring every signature. A rare copy is on view here next to a monumental 1819 copperplate by John Binns.

The Binns printing is a showstopper, with the text of the Declaration, a facsimile of the signatures, portraits of Washington, Jefferson, and John Hancock, and the seal of each of the original 13 states. It took three years to create at a cost of $9,000 ($250K today). It’s on display next to the original copper plate, which really makes you appreciate the artistry of perfectly carving each signature backwards into the metal.

Which one is the original?

The Binns plate and printing are a highlight for exhibition curator Dr. David Gary, also APS’s associate director of collections. He spoke with me at the show’s April 10 opening.

Anyone who visits These Truths will gain new understanding of what a dynamic and difficult process American independence was and continues to be. With all these drafts and versions, Gary still wonders what constitutes the “original” Declaration.

The Continental Congress’s 1775 response to their King presages not only the Declaration but the US Constitution and Bill of Rights, writing “In the name of the people of these United Colonies” and referring to their “arms” as a “resource which Freemen will never part with.” The colonists’ objection to their sovereign’s abuse of their constitutional rights could be written verbatim on a No Kings protest sign in 2026, and when they say, “Proclamations have been sometimes dangerous engines in the hands of those in power,” they could be talking about President Trump’s deluge of illegal executive orders.

Another new era for the Declaration?

I asked Gary whether our current moment might be a new milestone in our appreciation for the Declaration, as in the early 19^th century. How will the Trump era change our concept of our founding documents? How will we relate to them in future?

“It won’t look like this,” Gary said, gesturing around him at the stately poster-sized prints. “Is it the same if you don’t see it in person?” he added, referencing our modern digital lives. “People will forget that these physical copies exist.”

That’s a pretty dark take from a curator of a show like this. I think there’s plenty of evidence that we’re not done with physical media. Philly has a thriving indie bookstore scene, for example, and the Friday morning opening of These Truths was instantly packed.

“People have forgotten about the power of seeing a physical artifact in front of them,” Gary said, noting that this experience has a unique ability to spur action.

I agree. Our democracy teeters today at the whim of a criminally unfit tyrant. Understanding that our Declaration was not just a document, but a passionate and contentious process, gives us agency in the now. At the show’s exit, visitors can share their own thoughts on paper, including this one on opening day: “The declaration of independence inspires me because it reminds me that people who have the power to do something should do it.”

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