The Journal of Negro History, Volume 4, 1919 | Page 9

proved an impracticable and unsuccessful solution of the so-called race problem.
CHARLES H. WESLEY.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Cf. Chapter XVII, Nicolay and Hay, Abraham Lincoln, a History.
[2] President Fillmore in his last message to Congress proposed a plan for Negro colonization and advocated its adoption. This part of his message was suppressed on the advice of his cabinet; but even had this not been done, there is no reason to suppose that the plan would have been adopted. President Buchanan made arrangements with the American Colonization Society for the transportation of a number of slaves captured on the slaver, Echo, in 1858.
[3] Eulogy on Henry Clay, delivered in the State House at Springfield, Illinois, July 16, 1852. The quotation here noted is taken from a speech by Henry Clay before the American Colonization Society, 1827. Lincoln continued: "If as friends of colonization hope, the present and coming generations of our countrymen shall by any means succeed in freeing our land from the dangerous presence of slavery, and at the same time in restoring a captive people to their long lost fatherland with bright prospects for the future, and this too so gradually that neither races nor individuals shall have suffered by the change, it will be a glorious consummation." The Works of Abraham Lincoln, Federal Edition, edited by A.B. Lapsley, VIII, pp. 173-174.
[4] "The political creed of Abraham Lincoln embraced among other tenets, a belief in the value and promise of colonization as one means of solving the great race problem involved in the existence of slavery in the United States.... Without being an enthusiast, Lincoln was a firm believer in Colonization." Nicolay and Hay, Abraham Lincoln--A History, VI, p. 354.
[5] Speech at Peoria, Ill., in reply to Douglas. Life and Works of Abraham Lincoln, II, Early Speeches. Centenary Edition, edited by M.M. Miller. The Lincoln-Douglas Debates, October 16, 1854; p. 74.
[6] In the same speech, Lincoln said: "I have said that the separation of the races is the only perfect preventive of amalgamation.... Such separation, if ever effected at all, must be effected by Colonization." The Works of Abraham Lincoln, Federal Edition, edited by A. B. Lapsley, II, p. 306.
[7] Nicolay and Hay, Speeches, Letters and State Papers, Abraham Lincoln, I, p. 235. Lincoln's Springfield Speech, June 26, 1857.
[8] Ibid., VI, p. 356.
[9] Richardson, Messages and Papers of the Presidents, VI, p. 54. First Annual Message, December 3, 1861.
[10] Section XI of Act approved April 16, 1862.
[11] Nicolay and Hay, Abraham Lincoln, VI, p. 356. Act approved July 16, 1862.
[12] Raymond, Life, Public Services and State Papers, p. 504.
[13] Nicolay and Hay, Abraham Lincoln, VI, p. 357.
[14] Charles Sumner in a speech before a State Committee in Massachusetts, said: "A voice from the west--God save the west--revives the exploded theory of colonization, perhaps to divert attention from the great question of equal rights. To that voice, I reply, first, you ought not to do it, and secondly, you cannot do it. You ought not to do it, because besides its intrinsic and fatal injustice, you will deprive the country of what it most needs, which is labor. Those freedmen on the spot are better than mineral wealth. Each is a mine, out of which riches can be drawn, provided you let him share the product, and through him that general industry will be established which is better than anything but virtue, and is, indeed, a form of virtue. It is vain to say that this is a white man's country. It is the country of man. Whoever disowns any member of the human family as brother disowns God as father, and thus becomes impious as well as inhuman. It is the glory of republican institutions that they give practical form to this irresistible principle. If anybody is to be sent away, let it be the guilty and not the innocent."--Charles Sumner's Complete Works, XII, Section 3, p. 334.
[15] Nicolay and Hay, Complete Works of Abraham Lincoln, II, p. 205. Nicolay and Hay, A History of Abraham Lincoln, VI, p. 356.
[16] Raymond, Life, Public Services and State Papers of Abraham Lincoln, p. 504. Nicolay and Hay, Complete Works of Abraham Lincoln, VIII, p. 1.
[17] Richardson, The Messages and Papers of the President, 1789-1897, p. 127. Complete Works of Abraham Lincoln, VIII, p. 97.
[18] A section of the emancipation proclamation states that it is the President's purpose upon the next meeting of Congress to recommend the adoption of a practical measure so that the effort to "colonize persons of African decent with their consent, upon this continent or elsewhere with the previously obtained consent of the governments existing there," will be continued. Nicolay and Hay, A History, VI, p. 168.
[19] It is interesting to note that the colored population seemed very little in favor of colonization. "It is something singular that the colored race--those in