You're listening to an Airwave Media podcast.

Hello, and welcome to Ben Franklin's World Revisited,

a series of classic episodes that bring fresh perspective to our latest episodes

and add deeper connections to our understanding of early American history.

And I'm your host, Liz Covart.

The Declaration of Independence is one of the most iconic documents in United States history.

But what do we really know about how it came to be?

In our most recent episode, historian Emily Sneff helped us explore the declaration through

your questions, questions that revealed just how complex, living, and contested this document

still is.

So in today's revisited episode, I thought we'd take a listen to the podcast that Emily helped

us produce back in 2017, episode 141, a Declaration

and Draft. Originally part of the Omohondro Institute's doing history to the Revolution series,

this episode features three distinguished scholars. Danielle Allen, who unpacks the philosophical

and political ideas behind the Declaration, Patrick Spiro,

who helps us explore the editorial influence of Benjamin Franklin, and Peter Onof, who guides

us through Thomas Jefferson's drafting process. Together, these scholars reveal that many

heads and minds shape the Declaration of Independence. They also help us dive into some of the documents' contradictions, especially around slavery and

equality.

So this episode first aired on July 4, 2017, and it still remains one of our most powerful

and one of our most popular episodes in our catalog.

So I hope you enjoy this look back at episode 141, a declaration in draft.

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