The quotation "all men are created equal" is part of the U.S. Declaration of Independence, which Thomas Jefferson penned in 1776 during the beginning of the American Revolution. The phrase was present in Jefferson's original draft of the declaration.[1][2] It was thereafter quoted and incorporated into speeches by a wide array of substantial figures in American political and social life in the United States. The final form of the phrase was stylized by Benjamin Franklin.[3] It has been called an "immortal declaration", and "perhaps [the] single phrase" of the American Revolutionary period with the greatest "continuing importance."[4][5]