The colonists have petitioned for redress repeatedly. They have warned the British and appealed for justice.
An excerpt from the Declaration of Independence reads:
In every stage of these oppressions we have petitioned for redress in the most humble terms: our repeated petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Nor have we been wanting in attention to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence.They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies in war, in peace friends.
The Declaration of Independence was written by Thomas Jefferson, with the assistance of John Adams and Benjamin Franklin. The document defined the rights of the people of the independent states.
The Declaration of Independence introduced a fundamental change in the view of government. Thomas Jefferson declared that governments were created to serve the people, and could only act with consent of the people. It created the democratic government.
The declaration consisted of two parts. The preamble describes the peoples rights and it states that " all Men are created equal" and have the God-given right to "Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness." The second part declares independence from Britain, and lists the colonies' issues against the British government. - MyRevolutionaryWar.com