Picture Independence Hall on July 4, 1776. The air is thick with tension and cigar smoke. After heated debate, the Continental Congress approves the Declaration of Independence. As the delegates rise, one quiet, steady-handed man walks forward with the final parchment. John Hancock signs with his famous bold flourish. Right beside it, Charles Thomson affixes his name as Secretary.

Picture a humid Philadelphia summer night in 1776. Candles flicker in a rented room on Market Street. A tall, red-haired Virginian, thirty-three years old, sits alone at a small writing desk, quill scratching across fresh parchment. Thomas Jefferson pauses, dips the pen again, and writes one of the most revolutionary sentences in human history: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal…” Outside, British warships hover in the Delaware River. Ins