Africa and the American Flag

by Andrew H. Foote

The increase of national prosperity, the promotion of national commerce, the relief of national difficulties, the preservation of national quiet, have all been urged on the different orders of men appealed to. It has been shown how all these circumstances would influence individual interests, while the higher Christian and philanthropic aims to be fulfilled by these efforts have not been overlooked. All this is perfectly right; and if right in us, it is also right in others. It would have been satisfactory if in the two parties, America and England, in respect to their measures towards African establishments, there had been more nobleness in their discussions, less national jealousies in all parties, less of sneering censure of national ambition, selfishness or grasping policy, while both parties were in fact making appeals to the very same principles in human nature, which foster national ambition, or selfishness, or grasping policy.

Although African colonization originated with, and has been sustained wholly by individuals, in the United States, England has regarded it in the same light with which this country has looked upon her acquisition of foreign territory.

There is, however, a high superiority in these schemes of African colonization, although it be but in degree. The best and holiest principles were put prominently forward, and men of corresponding character called forth to direct them. They sought sympathy and aid from the English African Association, and from the Bible and Missionary Societies of this land. They were truly efforts of Christianity, throwing its solid intelligence and earnest affections into action for the conquest of a continent, by returning the Africans to their home, and making this conquest a work of faith and labor of love.

The slavery imported and grafted on this country by foreign political supremacy, when the country was helpless, has been subjected to a trial never undergone by such an institution in any other part of the world. An enemy held dominion where slavery existed, and while the masters were called upon to fight for their own political independence, there was opportunity for the slave to revolt or escape if such had been his wish. Those who are not acquainted with the ties uniting the slave to his master’s household, and the interest he feels in his master’s welfare, would expect that when a hostile army was present to rescue and to defend them, the whole slave population would rise with eager fury to avenge their subjection, or with eager hope to escape from it. But the historical truth is, that very few indeed of the colored men of the United States, whether slaves or free, joined the English or Tory party in the Revolutionary War. Thus the character impressed on the institution frustrated the recorded expectation of those who forced this evil upon a reluctant people—that the position and the influence of the negro in society would forever check republican spirit and keep the country in dependence.

The small number of colored persons who did join the English produced no slight difficulty. That small number ought perhaps to have been easily amalgamated somehow or other with the vast amount of the English population. That this did not happen, and did not seem possible, is perfectly evident. Either color, or character, or position, or something else, which it is for the English people to explain, prevented this. Many of them were found in the lanes and dens of vice in London, without the prospect of their ever amalgamating with the Londoners, and therefore only combining incumbrance, nuisance, and danger by their presence there.

This condition of things, as is well known, excited the attention and sympathy of Granville Sharpe, and led to the foundation of the colony of Sierra Leone, as a refuge for them.

Great Britain found herself hampered on a subsequent occasion with the charge of a few hundreds of the Maroons, or independent free negroes of Jamaica. It was known that it would not answer to intermingle them with the slave population of that island. The public good was found imperiously to require that they should be removed elsewhere. They afterwards constituted the most trustworthy portion of the population of Sierra Leone.

Similar difficulties have pressed with a manifold weight on society in this country. Jefferson, with other distinguished statesmen, endeavored to remedy them. Marshall, Clay, Randolph, and others shared in his anxieties. A suitable location was sought after for the settlement of the free negroes in the lands of the West. The Portuguese government was afterwards sounded for the acquisition of some place in South America. But these schemes were comparatively valueless, for they wanted the main requisite,—that Africa itself should share in the undertaking.

When Christian benevolence looked abroad upon the face of the world to examine its condition and its wants, Africa was seen, dark, gloomy, and vast and hopeless, with Egyptian darkness upon it,—“darkness that might be felt,”—while Europe guarded and fought for it as a human cattle-fold, to be plundered with an extent and atrocity of rapine such as the world elsewhere had never beheld. Africa, therefore, became the object of deep interest to the Christian philanthropy of this country, and all things concurred to bring out some great enterprise for its benefit and that of the African race in America.

In 1773 slavery was not only common in New England, but the slave-trade was extensively carried on in Rhode Island and other northern states. Dr. Hopkins became convinced of the injustice of the traffic, and in conjunction with Dr. Stiles, afterwards President of Yale College, made an appeal to the public in behalf of some colored men whom he was preparing for an African mission. These men were nearly qualified for proceeding to Africa when the Revolutionary War frustrated the scheme, which, in its character, was rather missionary than colonial.