Richmond Enquirer

S. A. PATRIOTS.
New-York, Nov. 20.

By the arrival on Saturday evening from S. America, we have received the Buenos-Ayres Gazette to Sept. 5th.

[Translated for the Commercial Advertiser.]

ACT.

The general session of Congress closed in the great and worthy City of Saint Miguel del Tucuman, on the ninth of July, one thousand eight hundred and sixteen.

The Congress of the United Provinces resumed its previous discussions, on the great and august subject of the Independence of the people which compose them. The voice of the whole territory was unanimously constant and decisive for its solemn emancipation from the despotic power of the kings of Spain.

Notwithstanding that their representatives devoted to so arduous a task all the energy of their talents, the uprightness of their intentions, and the interest which the sanction of be a free nation, and independent of the kings of Spain, and of their metropolis; they immediately cried out, full of the holy order of justice, and one after another repeated successively their unanimous and spontaneous decision for the Independence of the country, in virtue of which they decreed the following DECLARATION.

WE—the Representatives of the United Provinces of South-America, in General Congress assembled, invoking That Eternal Power, Who presides over the Universe, in the name and by the authority of the people whom we represent, protesting to Heaven, to all nations, & to all men, the justice which rules our decision—Solemnly declare, in the face of the whole World, that it is the unanimous and unquestionable will of these Provinces, to break the burdensome chains which unite them to the Kings of Spain, to resume the right of which they have been dispossessed, and invest themselves with the high character of a free nation, and independent of King Ferdinand the VIIth, his successors, and their metropolis: to remain consequently in full right, with an ample and full power to give themselves the form of government which justice dictates, and the increase of their actual circumstances demand: thus, all and each of them publish, declare, and confirm, obliging themselves, through us, to the fulfillment & maintenance of this their own will, pledging as security & guarantee, their lives, fortunes & honours.

The present declaration shall be communicated to all whom it may concern: for its publication and in virtue of the respect due to all nations—let them explain by a manifesto the great motives which have given place to the solemn declaration.—Past in the Hotel of Sessions.—Signed with our hands, sealed with the seal of Congress, and certified by our Secretary

[Here follows the names of the Deputies of the different States and Provinces.]