The most influential people who gave thought to this question finally decided that the colonization of the Negro in Africa was the only solution of the problem.  The plan of African colonization appealed more generally to the people of both North and South than the other efforts, which, at best, could do no more than to offer local or temporary relief.  The African colonizationists proceeded on the basis that the Negroes had no chance for racial development in this country.  They could secure no kind of honorable employment, could not associate with congenial white friends whose minds and pursuits might operate as a stimulus upon their industry and could not rise to the level of the successful professional or business men found around them.  In short, they must ever be hewers of wood and drawers of water.[2]

To emphasize further the necessity of emigration to Africa the advocates of deportation to foreign soil generally referred to the condition of the migrating Negroes as a case in evidence.  “So long,” said one, “as you must sit, stand, walk, ride, dwell, eat and sleep here and the Negro there, he cannot be free in any part of the country."[3] This idea working through the minds of northern men, who had for years thought merely of the injustice of slavery, began to change their attitude toward the abolitionists who had never undertaken to solve the problem of the blacks who were seeking refuge in the North.  Many thinkers controlling public opinion then gave audience to the colonizationists and circles once closed to them were thereafter opened.[4]

There was, therefore, a tendency toward a more systematic effort than had hitherto characterized the endeavors of the colonizationists.  The objects of their philanthropy were not to be stolen away and hurried off to an uncongenial land for the oppressed.  They were in accordance with the exigencies of their new situation to be prepared by instruction in mechanic arts, agriculture, science and Biblical literature that some might lead in the higher pursuits and others might skilfully serve their fellows.[5] Private enterprise was at first depended on to carry out the schemes but it soon became evident that a better method was necessary.  Finally out of the proposals of various thinkers and out of the actual colonization feats of Paul Cuffe, a Negro, came a national meeting for this purpose, held in Washington, December, 1816, and the organization of the American Colonization Society.  This meeting was attended by some of the most prominent men in the United States, among whom were Henry Clay, Francis S. Key, Bishop William Meade, John Randolph and Judge Bushrod Washington.