The Importance of the Declaration of Independence

Abraham Lincoln once said he never had a feeling politically that did not spring from the sentiments embodied in the Declaration of Independence. He didn't have much to say about slavery until 18, well, the end of the 1840s into the 1850s. The declaration gives him access to an idea of natural law and natural rights that simply can't be refuted in any legitimate American environment. If Americans are Americans, then the declarations is their sacred document.