Takaki and the Declaration

Once again, Ronald Takaki barely mentions something that I find to be an important topic in American History and the development of an American Identity...There were five pages that referenced the declaration of Independence, and these were all in passing.
When the Declaration is mentioned, it is almost always in this form "Thomas Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence...(rant about how everyone hated him).  Okay...not really (Three out of five times, it talks about how hypocritical it was of Jefferson to keep slaves), but it's usually referenced when referring to an issue of race, whether it be slavery or the Japanese Internment Camps during WW2.
I'm just confused to his motivations because these are important things he's skipping over.  It's interesting to me that he would skip over such important things when they do influence Americans and how they view themselves. Is this to emphasize how the Declaration only really seems to help white, aristocratic, male members of society?  Or is he just glossing over it because someone reading his book would have their own perceptions of it?  I can get his devaluing of Ben Franklin (my god, yes I can) and I could kind of justify the lack of Boston Tea Party...but I just don't understand.