The Lee Resolution, also known as the resolution of independence, was an act of the Second Continental Congress declaring the United Colonies to be independent of the British Empire. Richard Henry Lee of Virginia first proposed it on June 7, 1776, after receiving instructions from the Virginia Convention and its President, Edmund Pendleton (in fact Lee used, almost verbatim, the language from the instructions in his resolution). Voting on the resolution was delayed for several weeks while support for independence was consolidated. On June 11, a Committee of Five was appointed to prepare a document to explain the reasons for independence. The resolution was finally approved on July 2, 1776, and news of its adoption was published that evening in the Pennsylvania Evening Post and the next day in the Pennsylvania Gazette. The text of the document formally announcing this action, the United States Declaration of Independence, was approved on July 4.
Read more about Lee Resolution: Towards Independence, Approval and Declaration
Famous quotes containing the words lee and/or resolution:
“To be able to see every side of every question;
To be on every side, to be everything, to be nothing long;
To pervert truth, to ride it for a purpose,
To use great feelings and passions of the human family
For base designs, for cunning ends;”
—Edgar Lee Masters (1869–1950)
“We often see malefactors, when they are led to execution, put on resolution and a contempt of death which, in truth, is nothing else but fearing to look it in the face—so that this pretended bravery may very truly be said to do the same good office to their mind that the blindfold does to their eyes.”
—François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld (1613–1680)