Why Was the Declaration of Independence Written?
Sarah Pruitt
When the first skirmishes of the Revolutionary War broke out in Massachusetts in April 1775, few people in the American colonies wanted to separate from Great Britain entirely. But as the war continued, and Britain called out massive armed forces to enforce its will, more and more colonists came to accept that asserting independence was the only way forward.
And the Declaration of Independence would play a critical role in unifying the colonies for the bloody struggle they now faced.
The road to revolution was paved with taxes.
Over the decade following passage of the Stamp Act in 1765, a series of unpopular British laws met with stiff opposition in the colonies, fueling a bitter struggle over whether Parliament had the right to tax the colonists without the consent of the representative colonial governments. This struggle erupted into violence in 1770 when British troops killed five colonists in the Boston Massacre.
https://www.history.com/news/how-the-declaration-of-independence-came-to-be
