Abraham Lincoln Quotes

See {625675}, {625686}, {625684}, {625682}, {625676} for additional quotations arguing for Black emigration.

Many whites thought that the solution to the problem of free and emancipated Negroes was to send them to Africa. They assumed that the negroes would by desirous of that solution also, but they rarely asked them. When they did, they received answers much like this one from one of the leading Black clergymen in America.

Lincoln, just before the Civil War, quoted Jefferson that if slavery were not ended in America the results would be disastrous. But Lincoln at the time probably did not imagine how right Jefferson was, and Jefferson himself probably 1 how terrible the Civil War would be.

Actually Blacks did all three. Some returned to Africa and established the state of Liberia. Others went to South America and most stayed in the United States and continued to help build the nation.

Abraham Lincoln in his famous eulogy to Clay in Springfield, IL, used this quotation.

More than a decade before the Civil War there were many proposals and plans for ending slavery in America without war. Many of these debates took place amongst major religious institutions. John Price Durbin, an eminent Methodist clergyman and former president of Dickinson College proposed one. His plan called for compensation to slaveholders and the relocation of the freed slaves to Africa—a form of ethnic cleansing. Brown disagreed with forced colonization to Africa. Instead, he suggested California as a voluntary option. Brown’s idea received about 9 months of serious consideration, but in January of 1848, gold was discovered in California and the Gold Rush was on. Black colonization of California was off the table.

See {625675}, {625686}, {625683}, {625682}, {625676} for additional quotations arguing for Black emigration.

This idea has been rejected by American Blacks from before the Civil War. There were many Black families that have been in America longer than Rockwell who always had the choice to go back to where they cam from if they were unhappy with America but they never did.

The response was supposedly to the President’s question of the feasibility of using the Navy to remove the Negro soldiers to another land. See {590147}. This quotation’s authenticity and accuracy are challenged by many scholars. The only source is the personal reminiscences of General Butler, a politician with Presidential aspirations who had his own agenda. The nuance of wording is very critical as to whether Lincoln was trying to accomplish export or whether he was asking Butler to staff out the feasibility so that Lincoln could deal with others who had raised the issue. There is no record of his having asked anyone in the Navy to staff out such a proposal, and the Secretary of the Navy at the time, Gideon Wells kept a detailed diary. Butler’s conclusion that 150,000 people could not be transported fast enough to exceed the breeding rate of those Blacks remaining also is challenged by many, especially if the Navy and the Merchant Service were both used. This casts even more doubt on the accuracy of the quotations.

This is the first formal call for reparations of some kind for slaves after freedom. It is almost always quoted when the issue of reparations for Blacks is discussed. Dwight was not some left wing liberal. Actually he was one of the most conservative Americans at the time. He was an ardent opponent of Thomas Jefferson (see {600384}.) and a staunch supporter of the Federalists. He was one of the major spokesmen for the establishment and upper class of the day. He was also an ardent Christian minister who saw slavery for what it was—an evil sin and an injustice to any humans in that condition.

Free Negroes were banned by many states and local governments or otherwise restricted in their movements and occupations. The “safety of society” referred to the belief of most Southern whites that the mere presence of free Negroes would undermine the slavery system and encourage slave revolts and retribution against the slave owners. At this point Jefferson was considering a plan to patriot Negroes back to Africa. Jefferson, at this point, thought that this might be the fairest and best solution for all.

Jefferson was referring to a plan then proposed and discussed to establish a colony in Africa which would be populated with free American Negroes and slaves when and if slavery could be ended. See Quotation xxx.

When the British first colonized South Africa, the area they used was akmost uninhabited or very sparcely so. However, some Black tribes (including the Zulus) were moving from the north and themselves were colonizing or annexing the areas to their kingdom. The British were most interested in Trading so did not have large land asperations. The Dutch white Boer Africanners, in contrast, wanted to farm the lands and use the range for their cattle. They wanted the land. The English policy was that there would be friendly relations with the Black tribes surrounding their Cape Colony and no one should take their land. However the Boers started attacking the Black areas and seizing their farms and villages. At first, the English assumed that the Blacks would easily be able to ward off the invasion as the Afrikanners had no professional troops like the British. However, the neighboring tribes were not very warlike or good fighters. They were being overrun by the Zulus coming from the North and the Boers from the South. The British Government had a real problem in that they would have to have British soldiers fight the white Afrikanners if they wanted to stop the illegal white invasions. This was the root of the Boer War where the British would be fully at war with the Africanners.

As a key member of Lincoln’s cabinet, William H. Seward was most concerned with preserving The Union. However, since the Constitution was written in 1787, there had been compromises made with the pro slavery forces of the South to give them proportionally more political power and to avoid interfering with the institution of slavery. The Dred Scott Supreme Court decision forced the Northern States to actively cooperate in enforcing and maintaining slavery. Large numbers of abolitionists had reached their limit and wanted no more compromises regarding slavery. Mrs. Seward was one of those. This quotation also illustrates the influence that some women had in politics even though women could not vote. Frances Seward was very much a political partner with her husband who was favored to beat Lincoln for the Republican Presidential nomination.

Like so many of his other predictions about America, he saw that the evil of racism and slavery was bound to cause the nation to implode. And this was decades before the Civil War, but the problem was inescapable to a critical observer like de Tocqueville.

In early New England the General Court served as both a legislature and a judiciary before separation of powers was introduced. 5 years later the Court banned importing African slaves at all. While slavery was not common in Rhode Island, the laws was not seriously enforced on those who would defy them. It does represent a public anti-slavery sentiment that existed in Early America. It would take 200 years for Rhode Island to finally eliminate all forms of slavery.

Lincoln early in his career had thought that voluntary Negro emigration would be a solution to the race problem in America. However, over time he lost his enthusiasm for this. Conversations with Black leaders had persuaded him that American Negroes had helped build this country and wanted their fair place in it. Hay thought that the idea was not only immoral but impractical and considered the suggestion always to be a proposed solution which would never be practically implemented. There were a few attempts and there was a society set up to encourage emigration. The Nation of Liberia was founded by returning American ex-slaves, but there has been friction between the descendants of the Americans and those of the natives ever since.

The American Colonization Society established the nation of Liberia in Africa for American Blacks. Approximately 15,000 Blacks chose to emigrate.

San Domingo was on the Island of Haiti. The government had attempted to have a colony there for American Blacks. Most Negroes of the time were not enthusiastic about colonization. The San Domingo colony was not very successful and most of the colonists were very unhappy. Lincoln gave this order and those who wished to do so were returned to the United States. This quotation also refutes the argument made by a that Lincoln favored forced emigration and colonization of Negroes. Early in his career had had favored colonization {590145}, as it was called, but never forced. See {40859}. And if he was in favor of forced colonization, the easiest thing he could have done was left the dissatisfied San Domingo colonists where they were instead of going to all the trouble to repatriate them.