TOTW - Our Priceless Heritage

"The Declaration of Independence . . . is much more than a political document. It constitutes a spiritual manifesto -- revelation, if you will--declaring not for this nation only, but for all nations, the source of man's rights. Nephi, a Book of Mormon prophet, foresaw over 2,300 years ago that this event would transpire. The colonies he saw would break with Great Britain and that 'the power of the Lord was with [the colonists],' that they 'were delivered by the power of God out of the hands of all other nations' (1 Nephi 13:16, 19).
"The Declaration of Independence was to set forth the moral
justification of a rebellion against a long-recognized political
tradition--the divine right of kings. At issue was the fundamental question of whether men's rights were God-given or whether these rights were to be dispensed by governments to their subjects.
This document proclaimed that all men have certain inalienable rights. In other words, these rights came from God."

(Ezra Taft Benson, "Our Priceless Heritage," Ensign, Nov. 1976, 33)