A US pre-abolitionist anti-slavery group, aimed at resettling freed slaves in Africa. It was supported by some slaveholders, anxious to keep freed blacks separate from slaves.
The American Colonization Society (in full, The Society for the Colonization of Free People of Color of America) founded Liberia, a colony on the coast of West Africa in 1817 and transported free blacks there, in an effort to remove them from the United States. The Society closely controlled the development of Liberia until 1847, when it was declared to be an independent republic.
History
The ACS had its origins in 1816, when Charles Fenton Mercer, a Federalist member of the Virginia state assembly, discovered accounts of earlier legislative debates on black colonization held in the wake of Gabriel's conspiracy.
The American Colonization Society was established in 1816 by Robert Finley as an attempt to satisfy two groups in America.
Both the these groups felt that free blacks would be unable to assimilate into the white society of this country. Henry Clay, a southern congressman and sympathizer of the plight of free blacks, believed that because of "unconquerable prejudice resulting from their color, they never could amalgamate with the free whites of this country."
On December 21, 1816, a group of exclusively white upper-class males including James Monroe, Bushrod Washington, Andrew Jackson, Francis Scott Key, and Daniel Webster met at the Davis hotel in Washington D.C.
Finley suggested at the inaugural meeting of an African Society that a colony be established in Africa to take free people of color, most of whom had been born free, away from the United States. Finley meant to colonize "(with their consent) the free people of color residing in our country, in Africa, or such other place as Congress may deem most expedient." The organization established branches throughout the United States. It was instrumental in the establishment of the colony of Liberia.
During the next three years, the society raised money by selling membership. The Society's members relentlessly pressured Congress and the President for support.
The ACS purchased the freedom of American slaves and paid their passage to Liberia.
The Society controlled the colony of Liberia until 1847 when, under the perception that the British might annex the settlement, Liberia was proclaimed a free and independent state, and provided with a constitution that was said to be fashioned after the American model. After the Civil War, when many blacks wanted to go to Liberia, financial support for colonization had waned. During its later years the society focused on educational and missionary efforts in Liberia rather than further emigration.
Preparation of colony
Jehudi Ashmun, an early leader of the American Colonization Society colony, envisioned an American empire in Africa. Like his predecessor Lt. Robert Stockton, who in 1821 established the site for Monrovia by "persuading" a local chief referred to as "King Peter" to sell Cape Montserado (or Mesurado) by pointing a pistol at his head, Ashmun was prepared to use force to extend the colony's territory.
First colony
The ship arrived first at Freetown, Sierra Leone then sailed south to what is now the Northern coast of Liberia and made an effort to establish a settlement. Also, the colony entered an agreement with the U.S. Government to accept freed slaves captured from slave ships.
Expansion and growth of the colony
During the next 20 years the colony continued to grow and establish economic stability. Since the establishment of the colony, the ACS employed white agents to govern the colony.
The society in Liberia developed into three segments: The settlers with European-African lineage;
Criticism of the ACS
Beginning in the 1830s, the society was harshly attacked by some abolitionists, who tried to discredit colonization as a slaveholders' scheme and the American Colonization Society as merely palliative propaganda for the continuation of slavery in the United States.
African Repository and Colonial Journal
In March 1825, the ACS began a quarterly, The African Repository and Colonial Journal, edited by Rev. Conceived as the Society's propaganda organ, the Repository promoted both colonization and Liberia. Among the items printed were articles about Africa, letters of praise, official dispatches stressing the prosperity and steady growth of the colony, information about emigrants, and lists of donors.
The aims of the society were various. It was supported not only by those who were abolitionists on moral grounds, but also by Southerners fearful of organized revolt by free blacks, and by Northerners concerned that an influx of black workers would hurt the economic opportunities of indigent white.
As a former Whig and an admirer of Henry Clay, Abraham Lincoln supported the Society throughout the 1850s. Oates has observed, Lincoln thought it immoral to ask black soldiers to fight for the United States and then remove them to Africa after their military service. While others like Michael Lind believe that as late 1864 or 1865 Lincoln continued to hold out hope for colonization, noting that he asked Attorney general Edward Bates if the Reverend James Mitchell could stay on as "your asistant or aid in the matter of executing the several acts of Congress relating to the emigration or colonizing of the freed Blacks."
Three of the reasons the movement never became very successful were the objections raised by blacks and abolitionists, the enormous scale of the task of moving so many people (there were 4 million free blacks in the USA after the Civil War), and the difficulty in finding locations willing to accept large numbers of black newcomers. Lemuel Haynes, a free black Presbyterian minister at the time of the Society's formation, argued passionately that God's providential plan would eventually defeat slavery and lead to the harmonious integration of the races as equals.
Library of Congress
In 1913 and again at its formal dissolution in 1964, the Society donated its records to the U.S. Library of Congress. The material contains a wealth of information about the foundation of the society, its role in establishing Liberia, efforts to manage and defend the colony, fund-raising, recruitment of settlers, conditions for black citizens of the American South, and the way in which black settlers built and led the new nation.
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