Good artists borrow, great artists steal. Apparently, Thomas Jefferson got the memo. It turns out some North Carolinians penned their own Declaration of Independence nearly a year before TJ scribed his. 

So, if Thomas Jefferson stole (borrowed/homaged) the language for the Declaration of Independence, why have we never talked about this? Well, there was one heck of cover up! 

To get the full story, we call up David Fleming, author of Who's Your Founding Father?: One Man’s Epic Quest to Uncover the First, True Declaration of Independence.