The Society for the Colonization of Free People of Color of America, commonly known as the
American Colonization Society (
ACS), was founded in 1816 by
Robert Finley, to encourage and support the voluntary migration of
free African-Americans to the continent of Africa.
There were several
factors that led to the establishment of the American Colonization Society. The number of freed slaves and their descendants grew steadily since the American Revolutionary War, and slaveholders were concerned about the Free Blacks' ability to aid their slaves to escape or to form a slave rebellion. It was also believed by many that, because of white racism, the "amalgamation," or integration, of African Americans with mainstream American culture was out of the question. They needed to relocate elsewhere, where they could live free of white prejudices.
The African-American community was overwhelmingly opposed to the project; in many cases, their families had lived in the United States for generations, and the prevailing sentiment dictated that they were no more African than the Americans were British. Contrary to stated claims that emigration was voluntary, some blacks were pressured to emigrate; in several scenarios, slaves were
manumitted on condition that they emigrate immediately.
[1]
Historian Marc Leepson has stated that "colonization proved to be a giant failure, doing nothing to stem the forces that brought the nation to
Civil War."
[2] Between 1821 and 1847, only a few thousand African-American blacks,
out of the then millions in the US, emigrated to what would become Liberia. Many of them died from tropical diseases. In addition, the transportation of the emigrants to the African continent, including the provisioning of requisite tools and supplies, proved very expensive.
Starting in the 1830s, the Society was met with great hostility from white abolitionists, led by
William Lloyd Garrison, editor of
The Liberator, who proclaimed the Society a fraud.
According to Garrison and his many followers, the Society was not a solution to the problem of American slavery — it actually was helping, and was intended to help, to preserve it