New national era. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1870-1874, 1873-04-03
The American C0lWnixati0n So
cIety.

The argument Of the leaders in the move
ment for sending to Africa the four or five
million colored people in the United States,
has smack of satire in it. The argument is
that it is the duty of the people Of the United
States to contribute to the enlightenment Of
Africa, by giving her the benefit Of its knowi-
edge of the arts and sciences that have made
the United States so glorious. In order to
do this the Colonization Society proposes to
send the late slaves and the late nominally
free people Of color over to Africa, and
through their knowledge Of science and the
arts Hume the darkness Of that heather land.
This is decidedly rich. The colored people
of this country afterserving an apprentice
ship of two hundred and fifty years in slavery
under an oppression that made it criminal to
teach them to read or write, emerging from
that oppression only to be brutally murdered.
their school houses burned down, their teach
ers slaughtered because of their wise and
laudable attempt to possess knowledge, are
the people that tho wisdom of the Colonial
ton Society deems the best qualified to adj
vance the arts and sciences in benighted AZ
RIGA. Is not this pretense of the Colonial
ton Society sarcasm or irony? BY those
most friendly to the Colonization movement
it is claimed that we are unfit to enjoy civil
rights in this country, unfit to sit on jurics,
unfit to occupy seat in a church of God,
where white people worship, unfit to attend
colleges where the arts and sciences are
taught, unfit to be legislators, in short, not
fitted for the enjoyment Of any rights that
belong to citizens Of the United States; yet
do these wise men of the Colonization Soci-
ETY. deem us the proper persons to represent
the progress Of the arts and sciences in this
country at the court of the King Of Dahomey.
1t is useless for the Colonization Society to
attempt to disguise their real motive in re-
gard to the colored people Of this country.
That society is impelled by an insane race
hatred and an inordinate dislike of seeing
the objects of their oppression rising out
of the depths of the degradation into which
they had been forced by a civilized, Christian
nation; so, through the fimsy pretext of
sending the colored people of the United
States to enlighten the millions on millions
of heather in Africa, its members hope to
witness the destruction of the American ne
gro, and that their oft-repeated assurance
that the negro is SO worthless that he cannot
progress in state of freedom may be verified.
How absurd does this pretense Of philan-
thropy on the part of the Colonization Soci-
ETY. appear when we remember that the peo-
pie of the most enlightened nations Of Europe
themselves intelligent and enterprising-
cannot, with all their intelligence, exert an
influence sufficiently strong to ameloratc the
sad condition Of their people in their own
land, and that they eagerly seek the United
States as the spot where real progress is to
be made. If the educated German, French
man, Englishman, or Irishman despair of SO
enlightening the ruling power Of their en-
lightened lands as to place their people on
the road to progress, how can it be expected
that the graduates of enforced ignorance and
slavery can make such an impression on the
heather of Africa as will conduce to the adj
vancement of both the teachers and the
taught.
In this country we are on the path of en-
lightenment and progress; here we meet the
oppressed of all nations struggling success
fully for more extensive happiness than
they could enjoy elsewhere here is enough
and to spare. On this continent the star Of
empire takes its course. We shall stay here,
it is our country, and we intend to enjoy it,