quote of the moment

"'Subjects.'

That's what Thomas Jefferson first wrote in an early draft of the
Declaration of Independence to describe the people of the 13 colonies.

But in a moment when history took a sharp turn, Jefferson sought quite
methodically to expunge the word, to wipe it out of existence and write
over it. Many words were crossed out and replaced in the draft, but only
one was obliterated.

Over the smudge, Jefferson then wrote the word 'citizens.'

No longer subjects to the crown, the colonists became something
different: a people whose allegiance was to one another, not to a
faraway monarch."

-- Marc Kaufman