Thus before the American Colonization Society had got well on its way
toward accomplishing its purpose of deporting the Negroes to Africa the
West Indies and British Guiana claimed the attention of free people of
color in offering there unusual opportunities. After the consummation of
British emancipation in those islands in 1838, the English nation came to
he regarded by the Negroes of the United States as the exclusive friend of
the race. The Negro press and church vied with each other in praising
British emancipation as an act of philanthropy and pointed to the English
dominions as an asylum for the oppressed. So disturbed were the whites by
this growing feeling that riots broke out in northern cities on occasions
of Negro celebrations of the anniversary of emancipation in the West
Indies.[l5]

In view of these facts, the colonizationists had to redouble their efforts
to defend their cause. They found it a little difficult to make a good
case for Liberia, a land far away in an unhealthy climate so much unlike
that of the West Indies and British Guiana, where Negroes had been
declared citizens entitled to all privileges afforded by the government.
The colonizationists could do no more than to express doubt that the
Negroes would have there the opportunities for mental, moral and social
betterment which were offered in Liberia. The promoters of the enterprise
in Africa did not believe that the West Indian planters who had had
emancipation forced upon them would accept blacks from the United States
as their equals, nor that they, far from receiving the consideration of
freedmen, would be there any more than menials. When told of the
establishment of schools and churches for the improvement of the freedmen,
the colonizationists replied that schools might be provided, but the
planters could have no interest in encouraging education as they did not
want an elevated class of people but bone and muscle. As an evidence of