At first, the Declaration only extended the Dream to white property-owners. However, the idea of inalienable rights was so powerful that laws were added to extend these rights to slaves, women, and non-property owners. In this way, the American Dream changed the course of America itself.
In the 1920s, the American Dream started morphing into something less about equal opportunity to become the best you can be, and more about the acquisition of material things. This change was described in the F. Scott Fitzgerald novel, The Great Gatsby. In it, the protagonist, "...believed in the green light, the orgiastic future that year by year recedes before us. It eluded us then, but that's no matter -- tomorrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther...