The Committee of Five of the Second Continental Congress was a group of five members who drafted and presented to the full Congress in Pennsylvania State House what would become the United States Declaration of Independence of July 4, 1776. This Declaration committee operated from June 11, 1776, until July 5, 1776, the day on which the Declaration was published.
The Jefferson Memorial depicts the Committee of Five on a pediment sculpture by Adolph Alexander Weinman.
Congress Voting Independence, by Robert Edge Pine (1784–1788), depicts the Committee of Five in the center
Writing the Declaration of Independence, 1776, Jean Leon Gerome Ferris' idealized 1900 depiction of (left to right) Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, and Thomas Jefferson of the Committee of Five working on the Declaration.
The Committee of Five presents their work to the Continental Congress on June 28, 1776. Painting by John Trumbull (1819)
Roger Sherman was an early American statesman, lawyer, and a Founding Father of the United States. He is the only person to sign all four great state papers of the United States: the Continental Association, the Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation, and the Constitution. He also signed the 1774 Petition to the King.
Foundation of the American Government. Roger Sherman is closest behind Morris, who is signing the Constitution. 1925 painting by John Henry Hintermeister.