Colonization Schemes
With Lee in retreat, Lincoln’s mind turned to the Emancipation Proclamation, which had been in his desk drawer for weeks. Since announcing to the cabinet his intention to issue it, he had been preparing the public mind to accept so momentous a step. To that end, he once again raised the colonization proposal. In mid-August, he gave a hint of future developments when he urged a group of Washington blacks to emigrate to Panama. The president realized that colonization would be politically necessary if emancipation were in the offing, for only something acceptable to conservative whites could be effectively provided for the freedmen. He told Kansas Senator Samuel C. Pomeroy that “he would emancipate as soon as he was assured that his colonization project would succeed.” To Pomeroy, Lincoln often quoted Kentucky Senator Garrett Davis’s remark that Unionists in the Bluegrass State “would not resist his gradual emancipation scheme if he would only conjoin with it his colonization plan.”158 John Palmer Usher of Indiana (arguably the most Negrophobic state in the North) told Lincoln that a colonization plan “will, if adopted, relieve the free states of the apprehension now prevailing, and fostered by the disloyal, that they are to be overrun by negroes made free by the war, [and] it will alarm those in rebellion, for they will see that their cherished property is departing from them forever and incline them to peace.”159 Orestes Brownson, who favored colonization, estimated that 75 percent of Northern voters were antislavery and 90 percent antiblack.
A few colonizationists argued that blacks would never receive decent treatment from American whites and would fare better abroad. From St. Louis, the sometime poet and civil servant William Davis Gallagher wrote his close friend Salmon P. Chase about slaves who escaped from bondage in the interior of Missouri but could find no work at St. Louis, and were unable to obtain passes to visit Illinois. Discouraged, they decided to return to their masters. Gallagher indignantly exclaimed: “in this manner the disability of color in the Border States … is operating to strengthen the hands of the very rebels who have brought upon the country its grievous troubles! If these poor people were out of the State, employment could be found for most if not all of them in neighboring parts of Illinois,” but the Black Laws of the Prairie State forbade them entrance. Gallagher scorned the hypocrisy of many Northerners: “The very people that at one moment denounce slave-holders as tyrants and sinners, the next moment turn their backs and shut their doors against the poor slaves whom accident or repentance has set free. Before we have Emancipation … I hope we shall have matured a system of Colonization: for if we have not, God pity the poor Negro!”160
The timing of the White House meeting, which represented the first occasion that blacks were invited there to consult on public policy, suggests that Lincoln was trotting out colonization to smooth the way for emancipation. If he had been truly enthusiastic about colonization, he might well have acted more swiftly on the appropriation that Congress had voted months earlier to fund the emigration of Washington’s blacks. Evidently, Lincoln urged colonization not primarily because he still believed in it, but rather because he wished to make emancipation more palatable to the Border States, to Unionists in the Confederacy, and to Northern Conservatives. There is good reason to accept the analysis of one observer who regarded the meeting as an attempt “to throw dust into the eyes of the Kentucky slaveholders.”161
James Mitchell, a Methodist minister and a former agent of the American Colonization Society, set up the meeting. Lincoln had worked with Mitchell in Illinois, and in 1862 appointed him commissioner of emigration in the Interior Department. In May, at the president’s behest, Mitchell published an open letter endorsing gradual emancipation and colonization. Two months later, he urged Lincoln to persuade black Washingtonians to take the lead in colonization, noting that “the Colored people of this District … for the most part are less inclined to remove therefrom than the Contrabands.” A “great emigration from the ranks of the Colored residents of the District” would not occur, for “they are to a great extent satisfied with their new liberties and franchises, with hopes of further enlargement.” It “will require time to enable them to realize that they are near the summit now—education must refine their sensibility, and a purer morality than has yet obtained amongst the free people of Color, must actuate them, before they will feel that an escape from their present relation to the American people is a duty and a privilege.”162 Lincoln sought to instruct them about their duty.
Colonization had been debated in Congress that spring and summer, with Missouri Representative Frank Blair and Wisconsin Senator James R. Doolittle, along with some Border State colleagues, supporting it enthusiastically. Blair asserted that it “was the negro question, and not the slavery question which made the rebellion, questions entirely different and requiring different treatment. … If the rebellion was made by two hundred and fifty thousand slave-holders, for the sake of perpetuating slavery, then it might be a complete remedy to extirpate the institution; but if the rebellion has grown out of the abhorrence of the non-slaveholders for emancipation and amalgamation, and their dread of ‘negro equality,’ how will their discontent be cured by the very measure [emancipation] the mere apprehension of which has driven them into rebellion?” Colonization, therefore, must follow emancipation.163 Doolittle cited familiar arguments in support of colonization, which he said was “in accordance with the natural laws of climate, in accordance with the difference of constitution existing between these two races; a solution to which nature itself is pointing; a solution by which the tropics are to be given to the man of the tropics, and the temperate zone to the man of the temperate zone. … it is God’s solution; and it is easier to work with Him than to work against Him, and wiser, too.”164
On July 16, a special congressional committee endorsed an emancipation scheme that included colonization, recommended an appropriation of $20 million to facilitate the voluntary emigration of American blacks, and noted that the most serious objections to emancipation arose “from the opposition of a large portion of our people to the intermixture of the races, and from the association of white and black labor. The committee would do nothing to favor such a policy; apart from the antipathy which nature has ordained, the presence of a race among us who cannot, and ought not to, be admitted to our social and political privileges, will be a perpetual source of injury and inquietude to both. This is a question of color, and is unaffected by the relation of master and slave.” The “most formidable difficulty which lies in the way of emancipation,” the committee argued, was “the belief, which obtains especially among those who own no slaves, that if the negroes shall become free, they must still continue in our midst, and, so remaining after their liberation, they may in some measure be made equal to the Anglo-Saxon race.” The “Anglo-American will never give his consent that the negro, no matter how free, shall be elevated to such equality. It matters not how wealthy, how intelligent, or how morally meritorious the negro may become, so long as he remains among us, the recollection of the former relation of master and slave will be perpetuated by the changeless color of the Ethiop’s skin, and that color will alike will be perpetuated by the degrading tradition of his former bondage.” The “highest interests of the white race, whether Anglo-Saxon, Celt, or Scandinavian, require that the whole country should be held and occupied by those races alone.” Therefore a home “must be sought for the African beyond our own limits and in those warmer regions to which his constitution is better adapted than to our own climate, and which doubtless the Almighty intended the colored races should inhabit and cultivate.”165 Congressional pressure to do something about colonization may well have prompted Lincoln to summon the black Washingtonians.
The president’s widely reported remarks to those men indirectly signaled his intention to emancipate at least some slaves. On August 14, after cordially shaking hands with the five black leaders who gathered at the White House, Lincoln reviewed the recent legislative history of colonization measures. In April and July, Congress had
appropriated a total of $600,000 for colonizing blacks abroad. The Second Confiscation Act of July 17 authorized Lincoln to “make provision for the transportation, colonization, and settlement in some tropical country beyond the limits of the United States, such persons of the African race, made free by the provisions of this act, as may be willing to emigrate, having first obtained the consent of the Government of said country to their protection and settlement within the same, with all the rights and privileges of freeman.” Lincoln said that he wanted to consult with his guests about how that money should be spent. In justifying colonization, which he had supported for many years in Illinois, he remarked: “You and we are different races. We have between us a broader difference than exists between almost any other two races. Whether it is right or wrong I need not discuss, but this physical difference is a great disadvantage to us both, as I think your race suffer very greatly, many of them by living among us, while ours suffer from your presence. In a word we suffer on each side. If this is admitted, it affords a reason at least why we should be separated.”
Lincoln acknowledged that American slaves were the victims of a uniquely cruel form of oppression: “Your race are suffering, in my judgment, the greatest wrong inflicted on any people.” Free blacks as well as slaves experienced discrimination: “even when you cease to be slaves, you are yet far removed from being placed on an equality with the white race. You are cut off from many of the advantages which the other race enjoy. The aspiration of men is to enjoy equality with the best when free, but on this broad continent, not a single man of your race is made the equal of a single man of ours. Go where you are treated the best, and the ban is still upon you.” Lincoln was careful not to say that blacks were unequal to whites; rather, he implied, blacks had been placed in an unequal position and were made unequal to whites. He did not specify how they had been so placed and so made, but a fair inference would be that whites had done so through discriminatory laws and institutions.
Lincoln asked his guests to consider how best to deal with the harsh reality of slavery and discrimination. “I do not propose to discuss this, but to present it as a fact with which we have to deal. I cannot alter it if I would. It is a fact, about which we all think and feel alike, I and you. We look to our condition, owing to the existence of the two races on this continent. I need not recount to you the effects upon white men, growing out of the institution of Slavery. I believe in its general evil effects on the white race. See our present condition—the country engaged in war!—our white men cutting one another’s throats, none knowing how far it will extend; and then consider what we know to be the truth. But for your race among us there could not be war, although many men engaged on either side do not care for you one way or the other. Nevertheless, I repeat, without the institution of Slavery and the colored race as a basis, the war could not have an existence.” Lincoln was acknowledging that the Civil War was caused by the South’s desire to maintain white supremacy at all costs. If no blacks had been in the country, no war would have occurred. His logic was sound, but the black committeemen doubtless thought to themselves: “It’s not our fault that we’re here! Don’t blame your troubles on us!”
From these hard realities Lincoln concluded that it “is better for us both, therefore, to be separated.” Colonization as he envisioned it would be voluntary. But how to persuade free blacks to leave the country when they did not want to? To this problem Lincoln now turned. Slavery could only be abolished if blacks agreed to emigrate. Those already free owed it to their enslaved brothers and sisters to spearhead a colonization effort: “I know that there are free men among you, who even if they could better their condition are not as much inclined to go out of the country as those, who being slaves could obtain their freedom on this condition. I suppose one of the principal difficulties in the way of colonization is that the free colored man cannot see that his comfort would be advanced by it. You may believe you can live in Washington or elsewhere in the United States the remainder of your life [as easily], perhaps more so than you can in any foreign country, and hence you may come to the conclusion that you have nothing to do with the idea of going to a foreign country. This is (I speak in no unkind sense) an extremely selfish view of the case. But you ought to do something to help those who are not so fortunate as yourselves. There is an unwillingness on the part of our people, harsh as it may be, for you free colored people to remain with us.”
Lincoln said that educated free blacks should take the lead by volunteering to be colonized, for they would serve as role models for slaves who might eventually be liberated. “If we deal with those who are not free at the beginning, and whose intellects are clouded by Slavery, we have very poor materials to start with. If intelligent colored men, such as are before me, would move in this matter, much might be accomplished. It is exceedingly important that we have men at the beginning capable of thinking as white men, and not those who have been systematically oppressed.”
Lincoln appealed to his guests’ altruism. “There is much to encourage you. For the sake of your race you should sacrifice something of your present comfort for the purpose of being as grand in that respect as the white people. It is a cheering thought throughout life that something can be done to ameliorate the condition of those who have been subject to the hard usage of the world. It is difficult to make a man miserable while he feels he is worthy of himself, and claims kindred to the great God who made him. In the American Revolutionary war sacrifices were made by men engaged in it; but they were cheered by the future. Gen. Washington himself endured greater physical hardships than if he had remained a British subject. Yet he was a happy man, because he was engaged in benefiting his race—something for the children of his neighbors, having none of his own.”
To the practical question of just where American blacks might move, Lincoln at first pointed to Africa. “The colony of Liberia has been in existence a long time. In a certain sense it is a success. The old President of Liberia, [Joseph Jenkins] Roberts, has just been with me—the first time I ever saw him. He says they have within the bounds of that colony between 300,000 and 400,000 people. … The question is if the colored people are persuaded to go anywhere, why not there? One reason for an unwillingness to do so is that some of you would rather remain within reach of the country of your nativity. I do not know how much attachment you may have toward our race. It does not strike me that you have the greatest reason to love them. But still you are attached to them at all events.”
Another possible relocation site was in the Chiriqui province of Panama, then part of Colombia (also known as New Grenada). Early proponents of colonization, including Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and Benjamin Lundy, had preferred the Western Hemisphere to Africa. In more recent times, the Blair family (especially Frank) had championed colonization there. Other antislavery leaders, including Lyman Trumbull and Richard Bissell of Illinois, James R. Doolittle, Gerrit Smith, and Theodore Parker, concurred. In 1861 and early 1862, Mexico and lightly populated Central American nations expressed interest in such schemes.
In urging his black callers to support colonization in Panama, Lincoln pointed out that that country “is nearer to us than Liberia—not much more than one-fourth as far as Liberia, and within seven days’ run by steamers. Unlike Liberia it is on a great line of travel—it is a highway. The country is a very excellent one for any people, and with great natural resources and advantages, and especially because of the similarity of climate with your native land—thus being suited to your physical condition. The particular place I have in view is to be a great highway from the Atlantic or Caribbean Sea to the Pacific Ocean, and this particular place has all the advantages for a colony. On both sides there are harbors among the finest in the world. Again, there is evidence of very rich coal mines. A certain amount of coal is valuable in any country, and there may be more than enough for the wants of the country.” Mining the coal “will afford an opportunity to the inhabitants for immediate employment till they get ready to settle permane
ntly in their homes. If you take colonists where there is no good landing, there is a bad show; and so where there is nothing to cultivate, and of which to make a farm. But if something is started so that you can get your daily bread as soon as you reach there, it is a great advantage. Coal land is the best thing I know of with which to commence an enterprise.”
Lincoln tried to convince the black leaders that the Chiriqui project was not a corrupt scheme designed to enrich a few greedy swindlers: “you have been talked to upon this subject, and told that a speculation is intended by gentlemen, who have an interest in the country, including the coal mines. We have been mistaken all our lives if we do not know whites as well as blacks look to their self-interest. Unless among those deficient of intellect everybody you trade with makes something. You meet with these things here as elsewhere. If such persons have what will be an advantage to them, the question is whether it cannot be made of advantage to you. You are intelligent, and know that success does not as much depend on external help as on self-reliance. Much, therefore, depends upon yourselves. As to the coal mines, I think I see the means available for your self-reliance. I shall, if I get a sufficient number of you engaged, have provisions made that you shall not be wronged. If you will engage in the enterprise I will spend some of the money intrusted to me.”
Abraham Lincoln: A Life, Volume 2 Page 69
