The more you read the more you find. Here is Thomas Jefferson in later life, writing his autobiography, and comparing the context of 1776 with that of 1688, and of King George III's actions with King James II –
"...the question was not whether, by a declaration of independence, we should make ourselves what we are not; but whether we should declare a fact which already exists:
That as to the people or parliament of England, we had always been independent of them, their restraints on our trade deriving efficacy from our acquiescence only, & not from any rights they possessed of imposing them, & that so far our connection had been federal only & was now dissolved by the commencement of hostilities:
That as to the King, we had been bound to him by allegiance, but that this bond was now dissolved by his assent to the late act of parliament, by which he declares us out of his protection, and by his levying war on us, a fact which had long ago proved us out of his protection; it being a certain position in law that allegiance & protection are reciprocal, the one ceasing when the other is withdrawn:
That James the IId. never declared the people of England out of his protection yet his actions proved it & the parliament declared it:
No delegates then can be denied, or ever want, a power of declaring an existing truth..."
• From Thomas Jefferson's autobiography, 1821 (online here)
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