So, we have a couple of different interpretations of self-evident, but I think that in either of them, it is clear (perhaps self-evident) that the authors are about to list some things that he is not going to back up. Whether they are clearly true (according to Mr. Jefferson and his colleagues) or they are simply bases for the next arguments, they are not subject to disagreement or discussion in this document.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
Well, and it’s very hard to tell what they mean by all men are created equal. It’s easy to get hung up on the personal history and behavior of the founders at this point, and the laws that they were responsible for. Clearly they didn’t think that people with dark skin were equal to them in any significant way, nor did they think that women were equal to them, nor that the indigenous people of the continent were equal to them, nor even that the itinerants or subsistence farmers of their own approximate heritage were their equals. They did, however—and I think this is important both for the Revolution and for the rhetorical persuasiveness of this document—mean to imply that they, sitting in Congress assembled, were the equal of the elected Members of Parliament, and were the equal of the hereditary Peers of the Realm, and furthermore were the equals of the Royal Family and the King.
This is a shocking piece of arrogance, a magnificent assumption of responsibility and authority, and a tremendous boost to the persuasiveness of the document. Remember that people reading this may well have heard of Mssrs Jefferson, Franklin, Sherman, Adams, Adams, Adams, Sully, Fitz, and One-Eye, etc, etc, but would have done so in their capacity as troublemakers, social critics, and conspirators, not in their capacity as Founding Fathers. Their audience (primarily affluent men of property or business, whose material support of the rebellion would make a difference in the outcome) (and troublemakers, social critics and conspirators in Europe, as well as those well-placed in governments there, whose support of the rebellion, material or tacit, would make a difference in the outcome) would not be thinking, as we are, about whether the principles laid out in the document would be enacted into law and custom. No, they would be thinking who are these guys; they would be thinking sez who, they would be thinking you and what army. The concern is not equality down but equality up. Not only are the authors of the Declaration claiming authority for themselves equal to that of Lords and Kings, but they are claiming authority for their listeners equal to that authority.
It’s masterful. And it works. And, more importantly, it does lay down a principle of government that we can attempt to implement in custom and law. It calls us to our best selves, even as we acknowledge that the Founders themselves failed their best selves. Even as we acknowledge that they didn’t even recognize their best selves, that they didn’t understand the principle the way we do. It doesn’t matter. Or, at least, it matters, but it matters less whether they lived up to the principle than whether we believe in it and live up to it ourselves. This document, like Scripture in a way, lives beyond itself and speaks beyond its time. The word equal speaks through Mr. Jefferson and his colleagues, through the parchment, through the political necessities of the moment (his and ours), through the intended meaning, through the decades of accrued meaning, to our hearts and our sense of ourselves.
chazak, chazak, v’nitchazek,
-Vardibidian.