May 20, 2008
The Associated Press: The Declaration of Independence looked a bit different before Benjamin Franklin got his hands on it, using a pen to scratch out the words "sacred and undeniable." He thought it would be better to make truths such as "All men are created equal" be "self-evident." Edits such as this are captured in a new interactive exhibit at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., that allows visitors to zoom in on the specific words and phrases that formed the basis of the American republic. The curious can see different versions of historic documents and examine them line by line, using touchscreens that show the library's first high-definition scanned images of the drafts.