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John Adams of Massachusetts was a leader of the American Revolution that achieved independence from Great Britain.
Samuel Adams of Massachusetts was an influential official of the Massachusetts House of Representatives and leader of the movement that became the American Revolution.
A prominent Patriot during the Revolutionary War, John Hancock was president of Congress when the Declaration of Independence was adopted and signed.
Roger Sherman of Connecticut is the only person to sign all four great state papers of the United States, plus the Petition to the King. His signature is found on the Continental Association, the Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation, and the Constitution.
Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania served in the Continental Congress during the American Revolution and negotiated the 1783 Treaty of Paris that ended the Revolutionary War.
Robert Morris was born in Liverpool, England. He left British shores in 1747 to join his father in Maryland. As a highly successful merchant and banker, Morris became known as the financier of the American Revolution.
James Wilson originally hailed from Scotland. Elected twice to the Continental Congress, Wilson was a leading legal theorist, his role providing a framework for comprehending the principles and rules that are enforceable in a court of law.
During the American Revolution, Thomas Jefferson represented Virginia at the Second Continental Congress. As a spokesman for democracy, he was the principal author of the Declaration of Independence.
A member of the prominent Lee family of Virginia that included Robert E. Lee, Richard Henry Lee was another key figure during the American Revolution. It was Lee who, at the Second Continental Congress in 1776, made the motion to declare independence from Britain.
George Wythe served on the committee that established the rules governing the Constitutional Convention.
George Clymer was an ardent and vocal advocate of independence. He's one of only six Founders who signed both the Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution.
George Read was a Continental Congressman from Delaware. Like Roger Sherman, Read signed the Petition to the King and Continental Association, both passed by the Congress of 1774, as well as the Declaration of Independence in 1776 and Constitution of the United States in 1787. However, his name is not on the Articles of Confederation, which Sherman signed.
A delegate to the Continental Congress from New York, Lewis Morris is intrinsically part of the heritage of what is now the Bronx, but was then Westchester County.
Benjamin Rush was a Pennsylvania delegate to the Continental Congress. He served as surgeon general of the Continental Army, and his knowledge of medicine would serve him well a few years later.
While lawyer, politician, and diplomat Robert R. Livingstone from New York was a member of the five-man committee that drafted the Declaration of Independence, he's famous for never actually signing it. Otherwise, he's known for administering the oath of office to George Washington when he assumed the presidency April 30, 1789.
A lawyer prior to the Revolution, Adams championed the right to counsel and presumption of innocence. He defied anti-British sentiment and successfully defended British soldiers against murder charges arising from the Boston Massacre (pictured). He was the first person to hold the office of vice president of the United States before becoming the nation's second president.
Hancock is especially remembered by Americans for his large, flamboyant signature, the most prominent on the document and which led to John Hancock or Hancock becoming a colloquialism for a person's signature.
Adams was already a powerful figure in the opposition to British authority in the colonies when he played a pivotal role in instigating the Stamp Act riots in Boston in 1765. He'd previously denounced the Sugar Act of 1764 when he was one of the first of the colonials to cry out against taxation without representation.
Sherman's name is on the Petition of the King, a request sent to King George III by the First Continental Congress in 1774, calling for the repeal of the Intolerable Acts. The monarch's rejection of the Petition was one of the causes of the later United States Declaration of Independence and American Revolutionary War.
Franklin ranked among the most influential intellectuals of his era. He was the first president of the Academy and College of Philadelphia (later the University of Pennsylvania), and founded the American Philosophical Society (pictured). He also garnered acclaim for his experiments with electricity, among other projects.
By 1775, Robert Morris was one of the richest men in America. But in later years, as a result of ill-advised land speculation, Morris fell into debt and was eventually declared bankrupt. His legacy survives, however, in that he's regarded as one of the founders of the financial system of the United States.
Wilson was one of the first four Associate Justices appointed to the Supreme Court by George Washington. Meanwhile, in his capacity as the first professor of law at the College of Philadelphia, he taught the first course on the new Constitution to President George Washington and his Cabinet in 1789 and 1790.
Jefferson was the nation's first US secretary of state, under George Washington, and then the nation's second vice president under John Adams. He was the country's third president from 1801 to 1809. Pictured is Jefferson with Washington and Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton.
Lee's prominent role in the events that shaped Virginia and the nation in the mid- to late 17th century, not least his 1758 election to the Virginia House of Burgesses—an assembly of elected representatives from Virginia that met from 1643 to 1776 as the first democratically-elected legislative body in North America—secured Lee's place as one of the most influential signatories of the Declaration of Independence.
As a jurist, Wythe was one of the first judges in the United States to state the principle that a court can invalidate a law considered to be unconstitutional. Pictured is State House in Philadelphia.
Clymer brought his significant managerial and financial skills with him to national political service: he served as Continental treasurer from 1775 to 1776. Clymer was also a slave owner. But as a member of the Pennsylvania delegation during the framing of the Constitution, he unsuccessfully opposed the slave trade.
George Read is considered the father of the State of Delaware. He was the author of its first Constitution in 1776, and of the first edition of the state's laws.
In 1777, Morris became county judge of Westchester. While in Congress, he was an active supporter of independence but was warned against signing the rebellious document by his brother Staats Morris, who was a general in the British Army. Unperturbed, Lewis Morris reportedly roared back, "Damn the consequences. Give me the pen."
The National Archives Museum in Washington, D.C. is the permanent home of the original Declaration of Independence, the Constitution of the United States, and the Bill of Rights.
Sources: (The New York Times) (National Geographic) (National Archives) (Connecticut Judicial Branch) (Encyclopedia Virginia) (Descendants of the Signers of the Declaration of Independence) (National Center for Biotechnology Information)
In 1793, during a yellow fever epidemic in Philadelphia, Benjamin Rush adopted a therapy that centered on rapid depletion through purgation and bleeding. At first widely condemned, his heroic methods were the key to conquering disease.
While the Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, the United States' rebellious document was actually signed on August 2, 1776. In all, 56 individuals put their hand to the Declaration, and by doing so became the country's Founding Fathers. Many signatories have been consigned to history, but a few stand out as truly remarkable men. That said, who are the most important signers of the Declaration of Independence, and why?
Click through and find out the names that mattered most.
The 15 most important signers of the Declaration of Independence
The signatories that mattered most
LIFESTYLE History
While the Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, the United States' rebellious document was actually signed on August 2, 1776. In all, 56 individuals put their hand to the Declaration, and by doing so became the country's Founding Fathers. Many signatories have been consigned to history, but a few stand out as truly remarkable men. That said, who are the most important signers of the Declaration of Independence, and why?
Click through and find out the names that mattered most.