ore, sought to colonize the freedmen on the west coast of
Africa, thus definitely removing the problem which was of such concern
to the planters in slaveholding States.

The colony of Liberia, on the west coast of Africa, was chosen as a
favorable one to receive the group of freed slaves. Branches of the
Colonization Society were organized in many States and a large
membership was secured throughout the country. James Madison and Henry
Clay were among its Presidents. Many States made grants of money and
the United States Government encouraged the plan by sending to the
colony slaves illegally imported. But to the year 1830 only 1,162
Negroes had been sent to Liberia. The full development of the cotton
gin, the expansion of the cotton plantation and the consequent rise in
the price of slaves forced many supporters of both emancipation and
colonization to lose their former ardor.

As the antebellum period of the fifties came on these questions loomed
larger in the public view. The proposition for colonizing free Negroes
grew in favor as the slavery question grew more acute between the
sections. Reformers favored it, public men of note urged its adoption
and finally, as the forensic strife between the representatives of the
two sections of the country developed in intensity, even distinguished
statesmen began to propose and consider the adoption of colonization
schemes.[2]

Abraham Lincoln, as early as 1852, gave a clear demonstration of his
interest in colonization by quoting favorably in one of his public
utterances an oft-repeated statement of Henry Clay,--"There is a moral
fitness in the idea of returning to Africa her children, whose
ancestors have been torn from her by the ruthless hand of fraud and
violence."[3] In popular parlance, however, Lincoln is not a
colonizationist. He has become not only the Great Emancipator but the
Great Lover of the Negro and promoter of his welfare. He is thought
of, popularly always, as the champion of the race's equality. A visit
to some of our emancipation celebrations or Lincoln's birthday
observances is sufficient to convince one of the prevalence of this
sentiment. Yet, although Lincoln believed in the destruction of
slavery, he desired the complete separation of the whites and blacks.

Throughout his political career Lincoln persisted in believing in the
colonization of the Negro.[4] In the Lincoln-Douglas debates the
beginning of this idea may be seen. Lincoln said: "If all