The Journal of Negro History
Chapter 88 : [244] Mercer's resolutions were pa.s.sed by the House of Delegates, December 14, 1

[244] Mercer's resolutions were pa.s.sed by the House of Delegates, December 14, 1816, pa.s.sed with amendment by the Senate, December 20, and concurred in by the House, December 21. Annals of Congress, 15th Congress, 1st session, II, 1774. Indiana, Georgia and Tennessee, all a little later, pa.s.sed similar resolutions. _American Quarterly_, IV, 397.

[245] American Colonization Society, First Annual Report, 8.

[246] Isaac V. Brown, "Biography of the Reverend Robert Finley, of Basking Ridge, N. J." (Philadelphia, 1857), 60.

[247] Printed in Brown, _Finley_, 60, 61. See also _African Repository_, II, 2, 3, and Matthew Carey, "Letters on Colonization and its Probable Results addressed to C. F. Mercer," Philadelphia, 1834, 7.

[248] _Niles' Register_, XI, 260. Colonel Ercuries Beatty president at the meeting. The committee appointed to secure signatures to the memorial consisted of the following names: Elisha Clark, John G.

Schenck, Dr. E. Stockton, Dr. J. Van Cleve, and Robert Voorhees. Byron Sunderland in his "Liberian Colonization," _Liberian Bulletin_, No.

16, 18, says this meeting was virtually a failure. The memorial may be found in the Cuffe ma.n.u.scripts. It was sent to Paul Cuffe by Robert Finley when the latter was in Was.h.i.+ngton seeking to bring about some general deportation movement.

[249] Gardiner Spring, "Memoir of Samuel John Mills" (Boston and New York, 1829), 10.

[250] Sunderland, "Liberian Colonization," _Liberian Bulletin_, No.

16, 18.

[251] Ma.s.sachusetts Historical Society, Collections, Second Series, II, 1.

[252] Report of a missionary tour through that part of the United States which lies west of the Allegheny Mountains (Andover, 1815).

[253] Thomas C. Richards, "Samuel J. Mills, Missionary, Pathfinder, Pioneer and Promoter" (Boston, 1906), 190, 191; Spring, "Memoir of Mills," 129.

[254] Spring, "Memoir of Mills," 125, 126; _African Repository_, I, 276. A school based on these principles was established in New York also, in October, 1816. While the above quotation was written by Mills in July, 1817, it is a fair representation of his idea for several years previous.

[255] An editorial in the _North American Review_, x.x.xV, 126.

[256] _Niles' Register_, XIV, 321. Thomas Doan, Aaron Coppock, James Boyd, Joseph Coin, and Elihu Embree signed such a statement.

[257] Jesse Torrey, Jr., "A Portraiture of Domestic Slavery, in the United States: with Reflections on the Practicability of Restoring the Moral Rights of the Slave, without Impairing the Legal Privileges of the Possessor; and a Project of a Colonial Asylum for Free Persons of Colour: including Memoirs of Facts on the Interior Traffic in Slaves, and on Kidnapping" (Philadelphia, 1817), 27-30.

[258] _Niles' Register_, XIII, 180.

[259] "Doc.u.mentary History of American Industrial Society," II, 157, 158.

[260] _African Repository_, I, 23.

[261] See the Western Courier (Louisville, Kentucky), for October 26, 1815.

[262] Paul Cuffe ma.n.u.scripts in the Public Library, New Bedford, Ma.s.s.

Paul Cuffe to Samuel C. Aiken, August 7, 1816; Paul Cuffe to Jedekiah Morse, August 10, 1816.

[263] _Ibid._, Robert Finley to Paul Cuffe, December 5, 1816, Finley asked that the reply if mailed to him at Was.h.i.+ngton be sent in care of his brother-in-law, Elias B. Caldwell.

[264] _Ibid._, Paul Cuffe to Robert Finley, January 8, 1817.

[265] Printed in Brown, _Finley_, 66 ff. The pamphlet was written before he came to Was.h.i.+ngton.

[266] Spring, "Memoir of Mills," 131.

[267] Ma.s.sachusetts Historical Society, _Proceedings_, First Series, XIX, 20.

[268] _African Repository_, I, 2, 3. Referring to Caldwell in an address at an annual meeting of the Society, January 20, 1827, Clay said: "It is now a little upwards of ten years since a religious, amiable and benevolent resident of this city, first conceived the idea of planting a colony, from the United States, of free people of color, on the western sh.o.r.es of Africa. He is no more, and the n.o.blest eulogy that could be p.r.o.nounced on him would be to inscribe upon his tomb, the merited epitaph, 'Here lies the projector of the American Colonization Society.'" Clay was historically mistaken. Similar things were said of Mills and Finley. This speech may be found in pamphlet form in the Library of the Ohio Historical and Philosophical Society.

[269] Spring, "Memoir of Mills," 131, 139, 140.

[270] Brown, _Finley_, 65, 66.

[271] _Ibid._, "A Respectable Resident of the District of Columbia to Brown," 64, 65.

[272] Sunderland, "Liberian Colonization," _Liberian Bulletin_, No.

16, 19.

[273] Virginia Historical Society, Collections, VI, 26; _Niles'

Register_, XI, 296.

[274] _Niles' Register_, XI, 296.

[275] Ma.n.u.script Record of the Meeting, Library of Congress. Copy furnished by the American Colonization Society.

[276] The _National Intelligencer_ reported the meeting. The substance of Clay's remarks is printed in Archibald Alexander, "A History of Colonization on the Western Coast of Africa" (Philadelphia, 1849), 77-82; in J. Tracy, "A View of Exertions Lately Made for the Purpose of Colonizing the Free People of Color in the United States, in Africa, or Elsewhere" (Was.h.i.+ngton, 1817), 4 ff.

[277] Alexander, "A History of Colonization," 82-87; Tracy, "A View of Exertions," 4-11. For a criticism of all the speeches before this meeting see David Walker, "An Appeal" (Boston, 1830), 50 ff.

[278] Torrey, "A Portraiture of Domestic Slavery," 69.

[279] Torrey, "A View of Exertions," 9, 10; Walker, "Appeal," 57.

[280] Spring, "Memoir of Mills, Samuel J. Mills to Ebenezer Burgess,"

July 30, 1817, 136.

[281] _Ibid._, 136.

[282] American Colonization Society, Eighty-second report, 7.

[283] See the _American Museum_, December, 1790, 285-286, for his plan.

[284] Thorton's activities have been related by H. N. Sherwood, "Early Negro Deportation Projects," in _Mississippi Valley Historical Review_, March, 1916, 502-505.

[285] The committee for the memorial consisted of: E. B. Caldwell, John Randolph, Richard Rush, Walter Jones, Francis S. Key, Robert Wright, James H. Blake and John Peter. The committee for the Const.i.tution: Francis S. Key, Bushrod Was.h.i.+ngton, E. B. Caldwell, James Breckenridge, Walter Jones, Richard Rush, and W. G. D.

Worthington.

[286] Mills wrote Cuffe, December 26, 1816, informing him of the activities in Was.h.i.+ngton and asked for information about Africa. He added a postscript: "If the general government were to request you to go out for the purpose of exploring in your own vessel would you engage in this service if offered proper support?" Cuffe Ma.n.u.scripts, Samuel J. Mills to Paul Cuffe, December 26, 1916.

[287] The signers of this Const.i.tution are given by Sunderland, "Liberian Colonization," _Liberian Bulletin_, No. 16, 20, as follows:

_Signers of American Colonization Society, December 28, 1816._

H. Clay Jno. Loockerman John Taylor E. B. Caldwell Jno. Woodside Overton Carr Thos. Dougherty Wm. Dudley Diggs P. H. Wendover Stephen B. Balch Thos. Carberry F. S. Key Jno. Chambers, Jr. Samuel J. Mills Charles Marsh Thos. Patterson Geo. A. Carroll David M. Forest John Randolph of Roanoke W. G. D. Worthington John Wiley Rob't H. Goldsborough John Lee Nathan Lufborough Wm. Thornton Richard Bland Lee William Meade George Clark D. Murray William H. Wilmer James Laurie Robert Finley Geo. Travers J. T. Stull B. Allison Edm. I. Lee Dan'l Webster B. L. Lear John P. Todd J. C. Herbert W. Jones Bushrod Was.h.i.+ngton Wm. Simmons J. Mason E. Forman Mord. Booth Ferdinand Fairfax J. S. Shaaf V. Maxsy Geo. Peter