William D. Coleman as vice-president finished the incomplete term of President Cheeseman (to the end of 1897) and later was elected for two terms in his own right. In the course of his last administration, however, his interior policy became very unpopular, as he was thought to be harsh in his dealing with the natives, and he resigned in December, 1900. As there was at the time no vice-president, he was succeeded by the Secretary of State, Garretson W. Gibson, a man of scholarly attainments, who was afterwards elected for a whole term (1902-1903). The feature of this term was the discussion that arose over the proposal to grant a concession to an English concern known as the West African Gold Concessions, Ltd. This offered to the legislators a bonus of £1500, and for this bribe it asked for the sole right to prospect for and obtain gold, precious stones, and all other minerals over more than half of Liberia. Specifically it asked for the right to acquire freehold land and to take up leases for eighty years, in blocks of from ten to a thousand acres; to import all mining machinery and all other things necessary free of duty; to establish banks in connection with the mining enterprises, these to have the power to issue notes; to construct telegraphs and telephones; to organize auxiliary syndicates; and to establish its own police. It would seem that English impudence could hardly go further, though time was to prove that there were still other things to be borne. The proposal was indignantly rejected.
Arthur Barclay (1904-1911) had already served in three cabinet positions before coming to the presidency; he had also been a professor in the Liberia College and for some years had been known as the leader of the bar in Monrovia. It was near the close of his second term that the president's term of office was lengthened from two to four years, and he was the first incumbent to serve for the longer period. In his first inaugural address President Barclay emphasized the need of developing the resources of the hinterland and of attaching the native tribes to the interests of the state. In his foreign policy he was generally enlightened and broad-minded, but he had to deal with the arrogance of England. In 1906 a new British loan was negotiated. This also was for £100,000, more than two-thirds of which amount was to be turned over to the Liberian Development Company, an English scheme for the development of the interior. The Company was to work in coöperation with the Liberian Government, and as security for the loan British officials were to have charge of the customs revenue, the chief inspector acting as financial adviser to the Republic. It afterwards developed that the Company never had any resources except those it had raised on the credit of the Republic, and the country was forced to realize that it had been cheated a second time. Meanwhile the English officials who, on various pretexts of reform, had taken charge of the barracks and the customs in Monrovia, were carrying things with a high hand. The Liberian force appeared with English insignia on the uniforms, and in various other ways the commander sought to overawe the populace. At the climax of the difficulties, on February 13, 1909, a British warship happened to appear in the waters of Monrovia, and a calamity was averted only by the skillful diplomacy of the Liberians. Already, however, in 1908, Liberia had sent a special commission to ask the aid of the United States. This consisted of Garretson W. Gibson, former president; J.J. Dossen, vice-president at the time, and Charles B. Dunbar. The commission was received by President Roosevelt and by Secretary Taft just before the latter was nominated for the presidency. On May 8, 1909, a return commission consisting of Roland P. Falkner, George Sale, and Emmett J. Scott, arrived in Monrovia. The work of this commission must receive further and special attention.
President Barclay was succeeded by Daniel Edward Howard (two long terms, 1912-1919), who at his inauguration began the policy of giving prominence to the native chiefs. The feature of President Howard's administrations was of course Liberia's connection with the Great War in Europe. War against Germany having been declared, on the morning of April 10, 1918, a submarine came to Monrovia and demanded that the French wireless station be torn down. The request being refused, the town was bombarded. The excitement of the day was such as has never been duplicated in the history of Liberia. In one house two young girls were instantly killed and an elderly woman and a little boy fatally wounded; but except in this one home the actual damage was comparatively slight, though there might have been more if a passing British steamer had not put the submarine to flight. Suffering of another and more far-reaching sort was that due to the economic situation. The comparative scarcity of food in the world and the profiteering of foreign merchants in Liberia by the summer of 1919 brought about a condition that threatened starvation; nor was the situation better early in 1920, when butter retailed at $1.25 a pound, sugar at 72 cents a pound, and oil at $1.00 a gallon.
President Howard was succeeded by Charles Dunbar Burgess King, who as president-elect had visited Europe and America, and who was inaugurated January 5, 1920. His address on this occasion was a comprehensive presentation of the needs of Liberia, especially along the lines of agriculture and education. He made a plea also for an enlightened native policy. Said he: "We cannot afford to destroy the native institutions of the country. Our true mission lies not in the building here in Africa of a Negro state based solely on Western ideas, but rather a Negro nationality indigenous to the soil, having its foundation rooted in the institutions of Africa and purified by Western thought and development."
3. [International Relations]
Our study of the history of Liberia has suggested two or three matters that call for special attention. Of prime importance is the country's connection with world politics. Any consideration of Liberia's international relations falls into three divisions: first, that of titles to land; second, that of foreign loans; and third, that of so-called internal reform.
In the very early years of the colony the raids of slave-traders gave some excuse for the first aggression on the part of a European power. "Driven from the Pongo Regions northwest of Sierra Leone, Pedro Blanco settled in the Gallinhas territory northwest of the Liberian frontier, and established elaborate headquarters for his mammoth slave-trading operations in West Africa, with slave-trading sub-stations at Cape Mount, St. Paul River, Bassa, and at other points of the Liberian coast, employing numerous police, watchers, spies, and servants. To obtain jurisdiction the colony of Liberia began to purchase from the lords of the soil as early as 1824 the lands of the St. Paul Basin and the Grain Coast from the Mafa River on the west to the Grand Sesters River on the east; so that by 1845, twenty-four years after the establishment of the colony, Liberia with the aid of Great Britain had destroyed throughout these regions the baneful traffic in slaves and the slave barracoons, and had driven the slave-trading leaders from the Liberian coast."[149] The trade continued to flourish, however, in the Gallinhas territory, and in course of time, as we have seen, the colony had also to reckon with British merchants in this section, the Declaration of Independence in 1847 being very largely a result of the defiance of Liberian revenue-laws by Englishmen. While President Roberts was in England not long after his inauguration, Lord Ashley, moved by motives of philanthropy, undertook to raise £2000 with which he (Roberts) might purchase the Gallinhas territory; and by 1856 Roberts had secured the title and deeds to all of this territory from the Mafa River to Sherbro Island. The whole transaction was thoroughly honorable, Roberts informed England of his acquisition, and his right to the territory was not then called in question. Trouble, however, developed out of the attitude of John M. Harris, a British merchant, and in 1862, while President Benson was in England, he was officially informed that the right of Liberia was recognized only to the land "east of Turner's Peninsula to the River San Pedro." Harris now worked up a native war against the Vais; the Liberians defended themselves; and in the end the British Government demanded £8878.9.3 as damages for losses sustained by Harris, and arbitrarily extended its territory from Sherbro Island to Cape Mount. In the course of the discussion claims mounted up to £18,000. Great Britain promised to submit this boundary question to the arbitration of the United States, but when the time arrived at the meeting of one of the commissions in Sierra Leone she firmly declined to do so. After this, whenever she was ready to take more land she made a plausible pretext and was ready to back up her demands with force. On March 20, 1882, four British men-of-war came to Monrovia and Sir A.E. Havelock, Governor of Sierra Leone, came ashore; and President Gardiner was forced to submit to an agreement by which, in exchange for £4750 and the abandonment of all further claims, the Liberian Government gave up all right to the Gallinhas territory from Sherbro Island to the Mafa River. This agreement was repudiated by the Liberian Senate, but when Havelock was so informed he replied, "Her Majesty's Government can not in any case recognize any rights on the part of Liberia to any portions of the territories in dispute." Liberia now issued a protest to other great powers; but this was without avail, even the United States counseling acquiescence, though through the offices of America the agreement was slightly modified and the boundary fixed at the Mano River. Trouble next arose on the east. In 1846 the Maryland Colonization Society purchased the lands of the Ivory Coast east of Cape Palmas as far as the San Pedro River. These lands were formally transferred to Liberia in 1857, and remained in the undisputed possession of the Republic for forty years. France now, not to be outdone by England, on the pretext of title deeds obtained by French naval commanders who visited the coast in 1890, in 1891 put forth a claim not only to the Ivory Coast, but to land as far away as Grand Bassa and Cape Mount. The next year, under threat of force, she compelled Liberia to accept a treaty which, for 25,000 francs and the relinquishment of all other claims, permitted her to take all the territory east of the Cavalla River. In 1904 Great Britain asked permission to advance her troops into Liberian territory to suppress a native war threatening her interests. She occupied at this time what is known as the Kaure-Lahun section, which is very fertile and of easy access to the Sierra Leone railway. This land she never gave up; instead she offered Liberia £6000 or some poorer land for it. France after 1892 made no endeavor to delimit her boundary, and, roused by the action of Great Britain, she made great advances in the hinterland, claiming tracts of Maryland and Sino; and now France and England each threatened to take more land if the other was not stopped. President Barclay visited both countries; but by a treaty of 1907 his commission was forced to permit France to occupy all the territory seized by force; and as soon as this agreement was reached France began to move on to other land in the basin of the St. Paul's and St. John's rivers. This is all then simply one more story of the oppression of the weak by the strong. For eighty years England has not ceased to intermeddle in Liberian affairs, cajoling or browbeating as at the moment seemed advisable; and France has been only less bad. Certainly no country on earth now has better reason than Liberia to know that "they should get who have the power, and they should keep who can."
The international loans and the attempts at reform must be considered together. In 1871, at the rate of 7 per cent, there was authorized a British loan of £100,000. For their services the British negotiators retained £30,000, and £20,000 more was deducted as the interest for three years. President Roye ordered Mr. Chinery, a British subject and the Liberian consul general in London, to supply the Liberian Secretary of Treasury with goods and merchandise to the value of £10,000; and other sums were misappropriated until the country itself actually received the benefit of not more than £27,000, if so much. This whole unfortunate matter was an embarrassment to Liberia for years; but in 1899 the Republic assumed responsibility for £80,000, the interest being made a first charge on the customs revenue. In 1906, not yet having learned the lesson of "Cavete Graecos dona ferentes," and moved by the representations of Sir Harry H. Johnston, the country negotiated a new loan of £100,000. £30,000 of this amount was to satisfy pressing obligations; but the greater portion was to be turned over to the Liberian Development Company, a great scheme by which the Government and the company were to work hand in hand for the development of the country. As security for the loan, British officials were to have charge of the customs revenue, the chief inspector acting as financial adviser to the Republic. When the Company had made a road of fifteen miles in one district and made one or two other slight improvements, it represented to the Liberian Government that its funds were exhausted. When President Barclay asked for an accounting the managing director expressed surprise that such a demand should be made upon him. The Liberian people were chagrined, and at length they realized that they had been cheated a second time, with all the bitter experiences of the past to guide them. Meanwhile the English representatives in the country were demanding that the judiciary be reformed, that the frontier force be under British officers, and that Inspector Lamont as financial adviser have a seat in the Liberian cabinet and a veto power over all expenditures; and the independence of the country was threatened if these demands were not complied with. Meanwhile also the construction of barracks went forward under Major Cadell, a British officer, and the organization of the frontier force was begun. Not less than a third of this force was brought from Sierra Leone, and the whole Cadell fitted out with suits and caps stamped with the emblems of His Britannic Majesty's service. He also persuaded the Monrovia city government to let him act without compensation as chief of police, and he likewise became street commissioner, tax collector, and city treasurer. The Liberian people naturally objected to the usurping of all these prerogatives, but Cadell refused to resign and presented a large bill for his services. He also threatened violence to the President if his demands were not met within twenty-four hours. Then it was that the British warship, the Mutiny, suddenly appeared at Monrovia (February 12, 1909). Happily the Liberians rose to the emergency. They requested that any British soldiers at the barracks be withdrawn in order that they might be free to deal with the insurrectionary movement said to be there on the part of Liberian soldiers; and thus tactfully they brought about the withdrawal of Major Cadell.
By this time, however, the Liberian commission to the United States had done its work, and just three months after Cadell's retirement the return American commission came. After studying the situation it made the following recommendations: That the United States extend its aid to Liberia in the prompt settlement of pending boundary disputes; that the United States enable Liberia to refund its debt by assuming as a guarantee for the payment of obligations under such arrangement the control and collection of the Liberian customs; that the United States lend its assistance to the Liberian Government in the reform of its internal finances; that the United States lend its aid to Liberia in organizing and drilling an adequate constabulary or frontier police force; that the United States establish and maintain a research station at Liberia; and that the United States reopen the question of establishing a coaling-station in Liberia. Under the fourth of these recommendations Major (now Colonel) Charles Young went to Liberia, where from time to time since he has rendered most efficient service. Arrangements were also made for a new loan, one of $1,700,000, which was to be floated by banking institutions in the United States, Germany, France, and England; and in 1912 an American General Receiver of Customs and Financial Adviser to the Republic of Liberia (with an assistant from each of the other three countries mentioned) opened his office in Monrovia. It will be observed that a complicated and expensive receivership was imposed on the Liberian people when an arrangement much more simple would have served. The loan of $1,700,000 soon proving inadequate for any large development of the country, negotiations were begun in 1918 for a new loan, one of $5,000,000. Among the things proposed were improvements on the harbor of Monrovia, some good roads through the country, a hospital, and the broadening of the work of education. About the loan two facts were outstanding: first, any money to be spent would be spent wholly under American and not under Liberian auspices; and, second, to the Liberians acceptance of the terms suggested meant practically a surrender of their sovereignty, as American appointees were to be in most of the important positions in the country, at the same time that upon themselves would fall the ultimate burden of the interest of the loan. By the spring of 1920 (in Liberia, the commencement of the rainy season) it was interesting to note that although the necessary measures of approval had not yet been passed by the Liberian Congress, perhaps as many as fifteen American officials had come out to the country to begin work in education, engineering, and sanitation. Just a little later in the year President King called an extra session of the legislature to consider amendments. While it was in session a cablegram from the United States was received saying that no amendments to the plan would be accepted and that it must be accepted as submitted, "or the friendly interest which has heretofore existed would become lessened." The Liberians were not frightened, however, and stood firm. Meanwhile a new presidential election took place in the United States; there was to be a radical change in the government; and the Liberians were disposed to try further to see if some changes could not be made in the proposed arrangements. Most watchfully from month to month, let it be remembered, England and France were waiting; and in any case it could easily be seen that as the Republic approached its centennial it was face to face with political problems of the very first magnitude.[150]