Great Americans of History
THOMAS JEFFERSON - A CHARACTER SKETCH
NEGRO COLONIZATION.
Mr. Jefferson believed in the colonization of negroes to Africa, and the
substitution of free white labor in their place.
He wrote to John Lynch, of Virginia, in 1811, as follows: "Having long ago
made up my mind on this subject (colonization), I have no hesitation in saying
that I have ever thought it the most desirable measure which could be adopted,
for gradually drawing off this part of our population most advantageously for
themselves as well as for us.
"Going from a country possessing all the useful arts, they might be the means
of transplanting them among the inhabitants of Africa, and would thus carry back
to the country of their origin, the seeds of civilization, which might render
their sojournment and sufferings here a blessing in the end to that country."
Many other eminent men have shared the same opinion, and not a few prominent
leaders among the Afro-American people.
But it is now an impossibility. The American negro is in America to stay. The
ever pressing problem of his relationship to the white man involves questions of
education, labor, politics and religion, which will take infinite patience,
insight, forbearance and wisdom to settle justly.
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