History of the Declaration of Independence - 3/3
History-Page 2 of 3 | History-Page 3 of 3 | Original Transcript
ADV: Declaration of Independence - VHS
With the return of peace, the keepers of the Declaration were mindful of
the increasing technological expertise available to them relating to the
preservation of the parchment. In this they were readily assisted by the
National Bureau of Standards, which even before World War II, had
researched the preservation of the Declaration. The problem of shielding
it from harsh light, for example, had in 1924 led to the insertion of a
sheet of yellow gelatin between the protective plates of glass. Yet this
procedure lessened the visibility of an already faded parchment. Could not
some improvement be made?
Following reports of May 5, 1949, on studies in which the Library staff,
members of the National Bureau of Standards, and representatives of a
glass manufacturer had participated, new recommendations were made. In
1951 the Declaration was sealed in a thermopane enclosure filled with
properly humidified helium. The exhibit case was equipped with a filter to
screen out damaging light. The new enclosure also had the effect of
preventing harm from air pollution, a growing peril.
Soon after, however, the Declaration was to make one more move, the one to
its present home. (See Appendix B.)
The National Archives, 1952 to the Present
In 1933, while the Depression gripped the nation, President Hoover laid
the cornerstone for the National Archives Building in Washington, DC. He
announced that the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution would
eventually be kept in the impressive structure that was to occupy the
site. Indeed, it was for their keeping and display that the exhibition
hall in the National Archives had been designed. Two large murals were
painted for its walls. In one, Thomas Jefferson is depicted presenting the
Declaration to John Hancock, President of the Continental Congress while
members of that Revolutionary body look on. In the second, James Madison
is portrayed submitting the Constitution to George Washington.
The final transfer of these special documents did not, however, take place
until almost 20 years later. In October 1934 President Franklin D.
Roosevelt appointed the first Archivist of the United States, Robert
Digges Wimberly Connor. The President told Connor that "valuable historic
documents," such as the Declaration of Independence and the U.S.
Constitution, would reside in the National Archives Building. The Library
of Congress, especially Librarian Herbert Putnam, objected. In a meeting
with the President 2 months after his appointment, Connor explained to
Roosevelt how the documents came to be in the Library and that Putnam felt
another Act of Congress was necessary in order for them to be transferred
to the Archives. Connor eventually told the President that it would be
better to leave the matter alone until Putnam retired.
When Herbert Putnam retired on April 5, 1939, Archibald MacLeish was
nominated to replace him. MacLeish agreed with Roosevelt and Connor that
the two important documents belonged in the National Archives. Because of
World War II, during much of which the Declaration was stored at Fort
Knox, and Connor's resignation in 1941, MacLeish was unable to enact the
transfer. By 1944, when the Declaration and Constitution returned to
Washington from Fort Knox, MacLeish had been appointed Assistant Secretary
of State.
Solon J. Buck, Connor's successor as Archivist of the United States
(1941-48), felt that the documents were in good hands at the Library of
Congress. His successor, Wayne Grover, disagreed. Luther Evans, the
Librarian of Congress appointed by President Truman in June 1945, shared
Grover's opinion that the documents should be transferred to the
Archives.
In 1951 the two men began working with their staff members and legal
advisers to have the documents transferred. The Archives position was that
the documents were federal records and therefore covered by the Federal
Records Act of 1950, which was "paramount to and took precedence over" the
1922 act that had appropriated money for the shrine at the Library of
Congress. Luther Evans agreed with this line of reasoning, but he
emphasized getting the approval of the President and the Joint Committee
on the Library.
Senator Theodore H. Green, Chairman of the Joint Committee on the Library,
agreed that the transfer should take place but stipulated that it would be
necessary to have his committee act on the matter. Evans went to the April
30, 1952, committee meeting alone. There is no formal record of what was
said at the meeting, except that the Joint Committee on the Library
ordered that the documents be transferred to the National Archives. Not
only was the Archives the official depository of the government's records,
it was also, in the judgment of the committee, the most nearly bombproof
building in Washington.
At 11 a.m., December 13, 1952, Brigadier General Stoyte O. Ross,
commanding general of the Air Force Headquarters Command, formally
received the documents at the Library of Congress. Twelve members of the
Armed Forces Special Police carried the 6 pieces of parchment in their
helium-filled glass cases, enclosed in wooden crates, down the Library
steps through a line of 88 servicewomen. An armored Marine Corps personnel
carrier awaited the documents. Once they had been placed on mattresses
inside the vehicle, they were accompanied by a color guard, ceremonial
troops, the Army Band, the Air Force Drum and Bugle Corps, two light
tanks, four servicemen carrying sub machine guns, and a motorcycle escort
in a parade down Pennsylvania and Constitution Avenues to the Archives
Building. Both sides of the parade route were lined by Army, Navy, Coast
Guard, Marine, and Air Force personnel. At 11:35 a.m. General Ross and the
12 special policemen arrived at the National Archives Building, carried
the crates up the steps, and formally delivered them into the custody of
Archivist of the United States Wayne Grover. (Already at the National
Archives was the Bill of Rights, protectively sealed according to the
modern techniques used a year earlier for the Declaration and
Constitution.)
The formal enshrining ceremony on December 15, 1952, was
equally impressive. Chief Justice of the United States Fred M.
Vinson presided over the ceremony, which was attended by
officials of more than 100 national civic, patriotic, religious,
veterans, educational, business, and labor groups. After the
invocation by the Reverend Frederick Brown Harris, chaplain of
the Senate, Governor Elbert N. Carvel of Delaware, the first
state to ratify the Constitution, called the roll of states in
the order in which they ratified the Constitution or were
admitted to the Union. As each state was called, a servicewoman
carrying the state flag entered the Exhibition Hall and remained
at attention in front of the display cases circling the hall.
President Harry S. Truman, the featured speaker, said:
"The Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and
the Bill of Rights are now assembled in one place for
display and safekeeping. . . . We are engaged here
today in a symbolic act. We are enshrining these
documents for future ages. . . . This magnificent hall
has been constructed to exhibit them, and the vault
beneath, that we have built to protect them, is as safe
from destruction as anything that the wit of modern man
can devise. All this is an honorable effort, based upon
reverence for the great past, and our generation can
take just pride in it."
Senator Green briefly traced the history of the three documents, and then
the Librarian of Congress and the Archivist of the United States jointly
unveiled the shrine. Finally, Justice Vinson spoke briefly, the Reverend
Bernard Braskamp, chaplain of the House of Representatives gave the
benediction, the U.S. Marine Corps Band played the "Star Spangled Banner,"
the President was escorted from the hall, the 48 flagbearers marched out,
and the ceremony was over. (The story of the transfer of the documents is
found in Milton O. Gustafson, " The Empty Shrine: The Transfer of the
Declaration of Independence and the Constitution to the National
Archives," The American Archivist 39 (July 1976): 271-285.)
The present shrine provides an imposing home. The priceless documents
stand at the center of a semi circle of display cases showing other
important records of the growth of the United States. The Declaration, the
Constitution, and the Bill of Rights stand slightly elevated, under armed
guard, in their bronze and marble shrine. The Bill of Rights and two of
the five leaves of the Constitution are displayed flat. Above them the
Declaration of Independence is held impressively in an upright case
constructed of ballistically tested glass and plastic laminate.
Ultraviolet-light filters in the laminate give the inner layer a slightly
greenish hue. At night, the documents are stored in an underground
vault.
In 1987 the National Archives and Records Administration installed a $3 million camera and
computerized system to monitor the condition of the three documents. The
Charters Monitoring System was designed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory
to assess the state of preservation of the Constitution, the Declaration
of Independence, and the Bill of Rights. It can detect any changes in
readability due to ink flaking, off-setting of ink to glass, changes in
document dimensions, and ink fading. The system is capable of recording in
very fine detail 1-inch square areas of documents and later retaking the
pictures in exactly the same places and under the same conditions of
lighting and charge-coupled device (CCD) sensitivity. (The CCD measures
reflectivity.) Periodic measurements are compared to the baseline image to
determine if changes or deterioration invisible to the human eye have
taken place.
The Declaration has had many homes, from humble lodgings and government
offices to the interiors of safes and great public displays. It has been
carried in wagons, ships, a Pullman sleeper, and an armored vehicle. In
its latest home, it has been viewed with respect by millions of people,
everyone of whom has had thereby a brief moment, a private moment, to
reflect on the meaning of democracy. The nation to which the Declaration
gave birth has had an immense impact on human history, and continues to do
so. In telling the story of the parchment, it is appropriate to recall the
words of poet and Librarian of Congress Archibald MacLeish. He described
the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution as "these fragile
objects which bear so great a weight of meaning to our people." The story
of the Declaration of Independence as a document can only be a part of the
larger history, a history still unfolding, a "weight of meaning"
constantly, challenged, strengthened, and redefined.
Appendix A
The 25 copies of the Dunlap broadside known to exist are dispersed among American and British institutions and private owners. The following are the current locations of the copies.
National Archives, Washington, DC
Library of Congress, Washington, DC (two copies)
Maryland Historical Society, Baltimore
University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA
Independence National Historic Park, Philadelphia
American Philosophical Society, Philadelphia
Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia
Princeton University, Princeton, NJ
New-York Historical Society
New York Public Library
Pierpont Morgan Library, New York
Massachusetts Historical Society, Boston
Harvard University, Cambridge, MA
Chapin Library, Williams College, Williamstown, MA
Yale University, New Haven, CT
American Independence Museum, Exeter, NH
Maine Historical Society, Portland
Indiana University, Bloomington, IN
Chicago Historical Society
City of Dallas, City Hall
Visual Equities, Inc., Atlanta, GA
Washington, DC (private collector)
Public Record Office, United Kingdom (two copies)
Appendix B
The locations given for the Declaration from 1776 to 1789 are based on the
locations for meetings of the Continental and Confederation Congresses:
Philadelphia: August-December 1776
Baltimore: December 1776-March 1777
Philadelphia: March-September 1777
Lancaster, PA: September 27, 1777
York, PA: September 30, 1777-June 1778
Philadelphia: July 1778-June 1783
Princeton, NJ: June-November 1783
Annapolis, MD: November 1783-October 1784
Trenton, NJ: November-December 1784
New York: 1785-1790
Philadelphia: 1790-1800
Washington, DC (three locations): 1800-1814
Leesburg, VA: August-September 1814
Washington, DC (three locations): 1814-1841
Washington, DC (Patent Office Building): 1841-1876
Philadelphia: May-November 1876
Washington, DC (State, War, and Navy Building): 1877-1921
Washington, DC (Library of Congress): 1921-1941
Fort Knox*: 1941-1944
Washington, DC (Library of Congress): 1944-1952
Washington, DC (National Archives): 1952-present
*Except that the document was displayed on April 13, 1943, at the
dedication of the Thomas Jefferson Memorial in Washington, DC.
For Further Reading:
- Bailyn, Bernard. The Origins of Independence. New York: Alfred
A. Knopf, 1968.
- Becker, Carl L. The Declaration of Independence: A Study in the
History of Political Ideas. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1942.
- The Formation of the Union. Washington, DC: National Archives
Trust Fund Board, 1970.
- Ferris, Robert G., ed. Signers of the Declaration: Historic
Places Commemorating the Signing of the Declaration of
Independence. Washington, DC: National Park Service, 1973.
- Goff, Frederick, R. The John Dunlap Broadside:
The First Printing of the Declaration of Independence. Washington, DC: Library of Congress, 1976.
- Gustafson, Milton O. "The Empty Shrine: The Transfer of the
Declaration of Independence and the Constitution to the
National Archives." The American Archivist 39 (July 1976):
271-285.
- Lucas, Stephen E. "The Stylistic Artistry of the Declaration of
Independence." Prologue: Quarterly of the National Archives
22 (Spring 1990): 25-43.
- Malone, Dumas. The Story of the Declaration of Independence. New
York: Oxford University Press, 1954.
History-Page 1 of 3 | History-Page 2 of 3
Reprinted from: National Archives and Records Administration
