Whose job is it to protect the rights of the people, according to the Declaration of Independence?

The significance in the Declaration of Independence lies largely in the fact that it laid the foundation for a country that thrived though the power of the people. The governed and the government empower each other, and it is this mutual commitment to empowerment that ensures protection for the nation’s citizens and guarantees their God-given rights. The founding fathers described a government created by the people and for the people. Thus, in a large sense, the people and the government are inseparable; they make up a larger entity—the nation—and it is a commitment to the nation as an entity that ensures its survival. This commitment—as well as the privileges it engenders—applies to civilians and to government officials alike. It is is up to the people” as a national group to determine what’s right for the country as a whole, to establish policy and create the laws, to obey the laws, and to ensure that the laws are upheld. Therefore, no one entity is responsible for protecting the rights of the people. It is the nation itself—a nation that can only survive and function as prescribed through the collaboration and involvement of the citizens.

The Declaration of Independence sets out a number of inalienable rights—life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Though these rights are given to us by God, we still need to have political institutions in place that will protect and secure them. That's why government exists, according to the Declaration. But not just any old government; certainly not the kind of government that existed in Great Britain and from which the American colonists wanted to break free. it must be government that derives its consent from those it governs: We The People. And if government fails in its duty to preserve and secure Americans' God-given liberties, then the people themselves have a right to alter the system any way they choose—even abolishing it outright if necessary. What matters more than anything else is liberty, and government is simply a means to its preservation and protection.