2. Compare the popular complaints against the rulers in such places as the Declaration and Sieyes’ piece. What historic inequalities was Jefferson thinking of when he wrote “we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal..” ?
One of Sieye’s main complaints is that the the “third state is everything” but in the political order is presented with “nothing” he there fore says they demand to become “something.” In “What is the Third Estate” Sieye’s is arguing that the third estate is the largest population and the largest labor force but receives not say in government or representation. The third estate wants “representatives in the Estates General” who are drawn “from its own ranks.”
Jefferson’s complaints about the government are similar to that of Sieye’s. In the Declaration of Independence he faults the Crown for being “destructive” and inflicting “abuses and usurpations” the equality of man kind. He complains about a lack of representation because the Crown “dissolved representative houses repeatedly.” While he is most unhappy with the lack of representation he is also upset with how the lack of representation has allowed for standing armies in colonies, taxes being imposed with out consent, and crooked juries.
The main inequalities that Jefferson was envisioning were that of taxation without representation—so economic inequalities— and historically the natural rights and citizenship rights that were brought up during the Enlightenment.
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