Liberia

Liberia, a nation on the west coast of Africa, emerged out of America's antislavery and abolitionist campaign of the early nineteenth century. The abolitionist movement, which comprised blacks and white northern philanthropists and clergy, adopted a strategy of emancipation and colonization in its campaign. It focused not merely on abolishing slavery, but also on colonizing freed slaves in a territory of their own outside the United States, preferably in the continent of origin of their ancestors, Africa. Many elements within the abolitionist movement believed that colonization would provide ex-slaves the opportunity to live a decent and true life of freedom in a territory of their own. Yet, colonization was also intended to allay Southern fears of perceived threat that a large, free black population posed to white society. Colonization was thus a way of ridding America of unwanted black population.

EARLY U.S. INFLUENCE

The American Colonization Society (ACS), founded in December 1816, undertook the task of the colonization of free blacks in Liberia. The society raised money, and with additional financial backing from U.S. Congress, embarked on a project to plant a colony in West Africa where free blacks could be repatriated. In January 1822, the society established the first settlement on Cape Mesurado, which later became Monrovia. Although many American blacks opposed repatriation to Africa, emigrations to the region nevertheless continued, leading to establishment of other settlements. By 1850 about 5,000 settlers lived in various settlements, which had now become incorporated as the Commonwealth of Liberia with Monrovia as capital, named after James Monroe, the sitting president of the United States when the first settlement was established. As a result of the American antislavery naval patrol off the coast of West Africa, Liberia also became home to New World-bound slaves rescued aboard slave ships still illegally engaged in slave trafficking. By 1867 the U.S. Navy had resettled about 5,700 recaptives in Liberia.

Before 1848 the international status of Liberia was anomalous. It was neither a sovereign state nor a colony of the United States. A constitution of 1825 that gave administrative authority over the commonwealth to agents of the ACS made it a private colony. Liberia's status, however, changed on July 26, 1847, when it declared its independence under a constitution strikingly similar to that of the United States. Joseph Jenkins Roberts, who in 1842 had become the first black governor, was elected the first president of the sovereign state now called the Republic of Liberia. Before World War II (1939–1945), Liberia did not feature prominently in America's foreign and commercial relations. Even though Britain and other nations recognized Liberia's independence soon after it was declared, the United States did not do so until October 1862, a reflection of America's racial prejudice. Barring missionary and maritime activities in Liberia, the United States had no significant political and economic relations with the new African state. Despite historical ties, the United States lacked consistent interest in Liberia, and only responded sporadically to it, often during critical periods of challenge to its sovereignty.

Liberia did face such periods during its formative years. A number of times its sovereignty was threatened by European imperialism in Africa. Already active in the scramble for African territories in the nineteenth century, Britain and France desired to expand their conquests by annexing Liberia. Indeed, in 1883, Liberia lost a portion of its original territory in the area north of the Mano River to Sierra Leone, a British colony. Again, in 1895, the Liberian territory beyond Cape Palmas was annexed by the French colony of Ivory Coast. America's attitude to European colonial encroachment on Liberia was to oppose it and defend the nation's territorial integrity. On occasions, America's intervention in the incessant boundary disputes with the British and the French, whose colonial possessions literally encircled Liberia, did help to preserve its independence. For instance, in 1862, following an appeal from Monrovia, the United States sent a warship to West Africa to thwart possible British annexation of Liberia.

From the early years of the foundation of Liberia, the settlers faced constant uprising from the indigenous ethnic groups. The interior people were particularly fearful of the settlers' expansion and encroachment on their lands and the extension of government rule into their territories. In many instances, the United States provided Liberia with military assistance in putting down uprisings by indigenous groups such as the Kru and the Grebo.

U.S. INFLUENCE IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

Despite the United States' lack of consistent interest in Liberia, its sporadic support for the nation during critical times ensured that it exercised informal influence over the African nation. America's influence further increased when the Firestone Rubber Company established rubber plantations in the country in 1926. Liberia soon became an important source of rubber to the United States. Through its operations in the country, Firestone came to play a significant role in Liberia's political economy.

During World War II, Liberia assumed an unprecedented importance to the United States when it served America's economic and strategic needs. Liberian rubber and other products such as palm oil became of critical importance to the Allied powers after the Axis takeover of the traditional Far East market. Also, when the administration of President Franklin D. Roosevelt assumed the control of an air ferry operation across Africa through which American bombers and other military supplies reached the Allied forces in the Middle East, Liberian ports and airfields provided strategic points along the ferry route. Liberia's support for the American war effort was rewarded with American modernization projects in the country.

In the course of Liberian history, two distinct groups have constituted the society. First were the immigrant settlers called the Americo-Liberians, born and bred in the United States, and, therefore, Eurocentric in orientation and outlook. Second were the various indigenous ethnic groups original to the area. The Americo-Liberian minority group emerged as the dominant class with special privileges, to the detriment of the indigenous population, which it relegated to a subservient position. The Americo-Liberians developed commerce, education, and social services, and a political system tailored along American democracy. Many Americo-Liberians were successful farmers and wealthy merchants, controlling a booming trade along the coast. From independence in 1847, the Americo-Liberians exercised almost total economic and political dominance of Liberia. Their political party, the True Whig, held power until April 12, 1980, when a bloody coup d'état led by Master Sergeant Samuel Doe, an indigenous officer, terminated their unprecedented control of power.

see also Abolition of Colonial Slavery; African Slavery in the Americas; American Colonization Society.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Clegg, Claude Andrew. The Price of Liberty: African Americans and the Making of Liberia. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2004.

Gershoni, Yekutiel. Black Colonialism: The Americo-Liberian Scramble for the Hinterland. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1985.

Hyman, Lester S. United States Policy Towards Liberia, 1822 to 2003: Unintended Consequences? Cherry Hill, NJ: Africana Homestead Legacy Publishers, 2003.

Reef, Catherine. This Our Dark Country: The American Settlers of Liberia. New York: Clarion Books, 2002.

Saha, Santosh C. Culture in Liberia: An Afrocentric View of the Cultural Interaction Between the Indigenous Liberians and the Americo-Liberians. Lewiston, NY: E. Mellen Press, 1998.