:1
COLONIZATION JOURNAL.
CONDDCTED BY JAMES HALL, GENERAL AGENT OF THE MARYLAND STATE COLONIZATION SOCIETY.
NeAV Series. BALTIMORE, 3IARCH 15, 1842. Vol. 1 No. 10.
REPRINT OF THE FIRST SERIES OF THE COLONIZATION JOURNAL,
CONTINUED.
The following article on the climate and seasons in Maryland in Liberia
by the editor of this Journal, then agent of the society, is taken from the
No. for January, 1836, and perhaps contains as interesting statements upon
these subjects as have since been laid before the public.
That No. of the Journal contains despatches from the colony as late as
August, 1835. The emigrants per schooner Harmony had then arrived, and
had received their lands at once. Suitable preparations had then been
made, and rice and provisions were in readiness for the supply and accom-
modation of one hundred emigrants. The colony was then in very healthy
and prosperous condition. *The annexed letter, signed Levi Norris, is in-
serted to shew what were the feelings of a man, who had been almost
forced by circumstances to go — who had then been in Africa but six months,
having gone out in the brig Bourne. Norris is a rough carpenter, a man of
industrious habits, and of respectable standing in the colony, and now, less
than at the time of writing, would be disposed to return to America.
The letter speaks for itself. Read it ye fawning, cringing, free coloured
men, and then ask yourselves, why you stay in this land of oppression
and degradation !
"You appear glad to notice a short extract of a diary of the weather,
published in the Liberia Herald. I should have continued the same during
my stay here, were it not for my repeated attacks of illness, which of
course, would have rendered it very imperfect, had I attempted its continu-
ation. I send you an abstract of it for the eight months, which only are
perfect. I think this will be more useful than a copy of the daily entries.
Mean Temperature.
Twelve days land breeze, sea breeze s. and sw. and
ssw. Generally showers at night, and some rain
during the day.
Land breeze three days, rain 12 days, sea breeze
June 76 79| 76J -
commerce, and a fair security for health and longevity. Such is the coun-^
try which invites the African of America to its bosom, and is freely tendered
to him with all its blessings. The people of colour throughout the United
States, I repeat, are now invited to repair to this asylum, and become free
independent members of a well organized republic, governed exclusively
by people of their own race and colour. None but an enemy can dissuade
them from accepting the invitatloni Every real friend will advise them to
go at once to a country where, and where only, they can enjoy equality of
rights and rise to the elevated stand which all benevolent men wish them
to occupy. What does the ambition bf the coloured man lead him to desire ?
Is it not to be connected with a community; in which he shall stand on a
level with all his fellows ; enjoy equal privileges, and claim and receive
the same respect and deference, which are accorded toothers? Without
those rights freedom cannot be a blessing, or rather without them, no man
can be said to be free. A freed-man in a country whose inhabitants do not
recognize him as an equal, cannot be called a freeman, in the republican
sense of the term: and this constitutes the difference between the coloured
man of the United States and Liberia. You see the one, degraded and dis-
franchised, while the other is honoured and respected. Here, the coloured
man politically is nothing — there, he is every thing. In Liberia (a name
156 MARYLAND COLONIZATION JOURNAL.
which indicates the freedom of its inhabitants) such distinctions cannot exist,
because white men have no participation in the government. They are as
perfectly excluded from it there, as the African is here. It is true. Governor
Buchanan is a white man, but properly considered, he is the agent of the
society, to dispose of the supplies sent for the assistance of emigrants, and
is the friend and adviser rather than the ruler of the people. On the other
hand, Mr. Roberts, the Lieutenant Govenor and acting Chief Justice of the
colony, I am informed, is a black man. Governor Russwurm of the Mary-
land section of the colony, whose letters and official communications would
do credit to the best of our own statesmen, is also a black man, and all the
officers under him are black men. The colonial legislature, which assembles
statedly, and transacts the same business as the legislature of Ohio does, is
composed entirely of coloured men, who are elected by coloured men ;
and their speaker, clerk, and other officers are of the same class. Their
courts of justice are organized like ours, and their judges, jurors, lawyers,
sheriffs and constables are all coloured men of their own selection.
Travellers, who have visited the country, report that in their legislature,
and in their courts of justice, business is transacted with as much order and
decorum as it is in this country. In short, they have a Avell organized
republic, composed entirely of people of colour, possessing all the intelli-
gence and information necessary to enact and administer the laws, which
the happiness and prosperity of the country require.
They and we have the same form of government, and the same instiu-
tions : and the only difference is, that ours is managed by white men, theirs
by men of colour.
If the disconsolate people, for whom this asylum has been prepared, at
an immense expense, had not been deceived by erroneous statements, and
flattered by deceptive hopes, they would have sought it long ago ; and
would now have been in the full enjoyment of every political and social
right appertaining to real freemen. Instead of seeking protection and ask-
ing privileges for themselves, they would now have been inviting others
to paticipate with them in all the rights and privileges which the most
ambitious can desire. What a contrast ! And yet it does not transcend
the truth.
Our coloured friends, (and I use that word to express its legitimate mean-
ing,) may rely on the fidelity, of the statement I have attempted to give. If
I have not been greatly deceived, instead of surpassing, it falls short of the
reality.
The American Colonization Society, which has accomplished all this,
was, no doubt, formed at the time designated by Providence, for the pur-
pose of effecting one of the most stupendous plans of benevolence, that the
earth has yet witnessed. The finger of heaven seems to point to the colony
they have founded, not only as the natural and enviable home of the coloured
men of the country, but as the means, by which the millions of benighted
people, who cover the continent of Africa, are to be reclaimed from bar-
barism, and the arts and sciences, with the religion and the morality of the
bible, carried through that vast continent.
The experience of centuries has proved, that the ear of the inhabitants
of Africa is sealed against the white man. He can make no impression on
that race. His life is not safe for a single hour in the interior of their
country. — Not so with the man of colour. The inhabitants of Liberia, are
already regarded by the natives, as a superior tribe of their own race ; and
so far as the colonists have become known to the neighbouring tribes and
those in the interior, a strong desire is manifested to imitate their habits
and mode of living, and to understand the religion taught and practised in
MARYLAND COLONIZATION JOURNAL. 157
the colony. — These facts show, that the society, by preparing a refuge for
the oppressed African of this country, has already opened a door sufficiently
wide to carry Christianity and the arts of civilization throughout that ex-
tended continent ; and that they are multiplying the only class of mis-
sionaries, who can approach the native African with the least prospect of
success.
Great events are sometimes brought about by means apparantly inade-
quate. If history did not attest the fact, we should be slow to believe that
the exposure of the infant Moses in a basket of bulrushes on the border of
the Nile, full of devouring crocodiles, laid the foundation of the rescue of
three millions of people from Egyptian slavery— an event which carried to
the promised land, the nation destined by Heaven to preserve the religion
of the Bible. The exposure and rescue of that infant, apparantly unimpor-
tant when it took place, did it not indicate the great events which it was
designed to accomplish, as clearly as the formation of the Colony of Liberia
indicates the emancipation of the continent of Africa.
Viewing the matter in thi^ I'gbt, may we not express surprise, that such
an institution should meet with opposition from any quarter, but especially
from the friends of revelation or the advocates of emancipation. We live,
however, in a land of freedom, where every man thinks for himself, and
acts on his own responsibility. — The friends and advocates of our society
cannot, as a matter of right, impeach the motives of those who withhold
their aid or oppose us by fair argument. Much less may we assail them
with vituperation and violence. This is not the course recommended by
the parent institution. They advise their friends everywhere to rely on
mild and conciliatory measures — to make their appeals to reason and correct
feeling, and as far as possible, to avoid angry disputation. The spirit they
breathe and inculcate is derived from that divine code which requires for-
bearance and kindness even to our enemies. In that spirit we desire to
approach such as have felt it their duty to oppose the cause we advocate.
We do not ask them to yield their opinions unconvinced, but to give cre-
dence to facts well attested, and listen to arguments fairly deduced from
them. The mass of testimony submitted to the world in favour of our cause,
is enough to produce conviction on every intelligent mind that will care-
fully examine it. Its opposers are invited and urged, in the spirit of can-
dor, to make this investigation, and then judge for themselves. We have
a right to require this at their hands, if they be honest men, and more so
if they be christians.
The time, fellow citizens, has come, when duty calls on every one of us
to make up and express an opinion, decidedly, on this momentous subject.
The question presented is this — shall the coloured people be encouraged
to remain here under delusive hopes which are never to be realised, and
without which they never can be either safe or happy, or shall they be ad-
vised to seek the home which the benevolence of their friends, guided by
the finger of heaven, has provided for them in Liberia? This is the ques-
tion, and on this question my opinion has been formed for many years; and
although on the score of benevolent feeling towards our coloured population,
I will not yield to any one, yet I never can approve of a plan for retainino-
and establishing them in this country. Such a plan I must oppose to the
extent of my influence, from a conviction that it would eventually terminate
in their ruin, and that in the meantime, ihey would have no guarantee for
personal safety, nor we for the preservation of the peace. The feelino-
which exists on this subject is gaining strength ; it pervades the great body
of the people, and no effort to change it, were it desirable to do so, can be
attended with success. Is it not, then, the dictate of wisdom to yield,
where perseverance must be unavailing?
158 MARYLAND COLONIZATION JOURNAL,
THE COLOURED POPULATION OF MARYLAND.
The excitement which has pervaded this city and State with regard to
the subject of the coloured population, has for the present subsided, in con-
sequence of the rejection of the Bill passed by the House of Delegates, in
the Senate. That the subject has been agitated at the present time without
any coalescence of the parties interested and any consequent satisfactory
action thereon, is deeply to be regretted. Of the expediency of any action
at the present time, or any change in the policy of the state government
with regard to this subject, we very much doubt. The quiet which the
state has enjoyed since the legislative act of 1831, is mainly attributable to
the course of policy then adopted, viz: that of gradual and voluntary colo-
nization of the free people of colour and manumitted slaves. And although
the effect has not been fully equal to what was anticipated or wished, yet
certainly all that could have been reasonably expected. The state has
been kept free from those unhappy and troublesome excitements, which have
pervaded most of the other border states of the Union ; and a way has
gradually been opened by which she may be ultimately freed from her
superabundant free coloured population with honour and justice to herself
and advantage to them. If there is existing in the state, as has lately
been maintained, two opposite and conflicting interests, (viz: slave and the
free labourer, or the tobacco and grain-growing interest;) if there have pre-
vailed opposite principles and feelings, political and religious, with regard
to this subject, the one advocating the perpetuity of slavery, and the other
its gradual abolition and extinction ; those interests, those principles and
feelings have been kept quiet and passive through the colonization policy
for the past ten years, from a confidence that the ultimate and true interests
of all had thereby been advanped. Recent movements in the state, 'The
Slave Holders Convention,' the Bill which passed the House of Delegates,
before noticed, and the proceedings of public nieetings holden in different
parts of the state to petition the Legislature with regard to the subject, have
served materially to change the aspect of affairs, and we believe much for
the worse. In fact, it could not be hoped that the agitation of this subject,
at this time, would be productive of other than bad results, especially as
action thereon must assume in sorne degree a party or sectional character.
The first movement \yas, as denominated, a Slave Holders Convention, the
full proceedings of \yhich we have in our January number, laid before the
public. The very calling of this Convention, to say nothing of its acts,
was the formation, the embodying of a pro-slavery party in the state, and
the separating it from other interests. The acts of this Convention were
the submitting of certain propositions to the state legislature, mainly calcu-
lated to produce two results which they considered necessar}' for the pre-
servation of their property, yiz : the prohibition of manumission, and the
expulsion of all free negroes from the state. Of the same character, also,
was the Bill which passed the House of Delegates.
The opposition to the acts of the Convention and the Bill, did not arise
from any concert of action or any general assemblage of those to whom the
Bill was exceptionable. It was spontaneous and simultaneous throughout
MARYLAND COLONIZATION JOURNAL. 159
the state, and was expressed by local county Conventions, and public meetr
ings in this city, through the press and the pulpits. Inasmuch as there was
jio concert of action in what might properly be called the "opposition party,
so the objections to the Bill, and the principles on which such objections
are based, have been various, and even contradictory. We wish our limits
perniitted the introduction of the resolutions and memorials adopted by
these meetings, and to make extracts from the many well written articles
which have appeared in the public prints upon the subject. The objections
to the Bill, however, may very properly be ranked under two heads, or
classes, viz: political and moral. — The first and most general objection of
the former character is, that the legislation is unnecessary, as the slave
property is already sufficiently protected by the statutes of the state — that
the legislation is partial, favouring only one interest of the many, and that,
at the expense of all others, by creating a multiplicity of offices, and greatly
increasins: the duties of those now in existence. It is maintained that it is
inexpedient to drive the free coloured population from the state, that their
services are essential to the grain growing interests, that the land cannot be
tilled without them, that the vacancies occasioned by their exit, could not
readily be filled, or their places supplied. The prohibition to manumisr
sion is objected to on the assum.ed ground that the freed negroes decrease
very rapidly, whereas the slaves steadily increase; and many acts or clauses
of the Bill are declared unconstitutional. What might be termed the mo-
ral objections to the Bill, are, that the agitation of the subject in any degree
is highly injurous to both the white and coloured population; that the ope-:
j-ations of the Bill upon the free coloured people would be cruel and unjust,
in depriving them of rights and privileges which they had long enjoyed — r
that they would be to a great extent debarred the privilege of receiving
moral and religious instruction— i^that the innocent would necessarily suffer
in common with the guilty — ^that many persons now absolutely free would
be reduced to slavery — that most of them would be driven from their natu-
ral home without any adequate cause — and finally, that the restriction to the
right of abolition is unjust and unconstitutional, as it deprives the citizens
of the state of the right of obeying the dictates of conscience, These so far
as we can judge are the principal grounds on which the Bill is opposed, and
the detail of these coyer a great deal of ground as do the various clauses and
provisions of the Bill itself. And as the intent of the framers of the Bill, and
its effect if passed and carried into operation would be to enslave many of
the free coloured people and drive the rest from the state; so the intent of
the objectors to the Bill and the result of action upon their principles as pro-
mulgated would be to retain them among us in their present degraded capa-
city; — to have our soil tilled by those who must ever remain serfs, instead
o{ freemen, and to perpetuate this moral slavery of the mind in the black
man so long as the white race shall retain the ascendency.
Of the comparative claims to political sagacity or patriotism by either, — r
the party which would bend legislation in the State of Maryland to the per-
petuity of slavery, or the one which would commit the labour of the land to
the rapidly increasing free coloured population, who can never be elevated
to the rank oi freemen or become citizens of the state, — of the claims of
the two parties to true moral motives of action, philanthropy and justice, —
those who would harrass, enslave or drive out sixty thousand people, the
160 MARYLAND COLONIZATION JOURNAL,
better to protect a species of property which no human power can protect
and render safe, — or the one which would retain this sixty thousand people
in their present state of intellectual and moral degradation, and who if im-
proved and enlightened would but the more clearly perceive and keenly
feel the value of political rights and social privileges, which it is declared
by all they shall never enjoy in Maryland, — we must confess we are un-
able to decide. The action of the former would doubtless be most objec-
tionable and cruel in its operation, the latter most disastrous in its conse-
quences. Speculation upon the subject, however, is premature and useless,
for the ground taken by either party is untenable and the execution of their
plans impracticable. The chances of the perpetuity of slavery are no
greater than when the sagacious and keen-sighted Jefferson pronounced
that '/lothing is more clearly written in the book of destijiy, than the final
emancipation of the blacks.' And we firmly believe it must necessarily
follow, that any effort at the present time to avert this event, must only
serve to hasten its consummation. We believe it equally certain that, even
were it desirable and for the best interests of the state to retain the in-
creasing mass of the free coloured population in their present position with
regard to the whites, the thing would be utterly and absolutely impossible.
The two races of men which now inhabit this state can only continue to
occupy it in the relation of master and slave, or form by an amalgation a
mongrel race. That the latter will not be the result arguments are unneces-
sary to prove. That the free blacks will not willingly continue in their
present position, is proved by the fact that emancipation has ever been con-
sidered a stepping-stone to equality of social and political rights — by the
change that is gradually being wrought in the character of the free coloured
population of the state — and by the repeated declarations and resolutions of
individuals and associations of the free blacks of Maryland and the adjoin-
ing states, that they are entitled to, and will claim even at the sacrifice of
life, equality of political rights with the whites.
We conceive, therefore, if action upon this subject is advisible at this
time, it ought not to be the action of parties or of sectional interests, but the
action of the whole white population of the state, whose ultimate interest in
this matter, is and ever must be one and the same. Let action also, if any
is to be had, tend to such result as it is practicable to accomplish, and
at the same time not incompatible with the best interests of any. Let the
question be put at once to every white inhabitant of the state, What is the
true policy to be pursued at this time with regard to the coloured popula-
tion ? And but one answer can be given. Colonization of the free blacks
and the manumitted slaves. Enlarge upon the policy already adopted by
the state, and which has for the past ten years been productive of the most
beneficial results. The removal of the free blacks to the land of their
ancestors, to the home provided for them at the expense of the state, where
they can enjoy all the privileges and advantages of a free and independent
government, administered by those of their own caste and colour, is the
only course which sound policy dictates, and the only one consistent with
justice to this long-suffering and much injured people — with the rights of
the slave-holding citizens — with the best interests of the labourino- white
population — and with the true honour of the state.
Ot5^ All communications intended for the Maryland Colonization Journal, or on busi-
ness of the Society, should be addressed to Dr. James Hall, General Agent, Coloniza-
tion Rooms, Post Office Building
Printed by John D. Toy, corner of Market and St. Paul streets, Baltimore.
