Getting Word
Brown Colbert
Learn more about former Monticello slave Brown Colbert's migration to Liberia.
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A Solution? Jefferson Proposes Colonization
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Jefferson’s letter to Edward Coles, August 25, 1814, suggesting the “expatriation” of slaves from the U.S.
Letter from Thomas Jefferson to Edward Coles, August 25, 1814, suggesting the “expatriation” of slaves from the U.S.
Library of Congress
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Monrovia, Liberia, 1825, African Repository and Colonial Journal, 1 [June 1825]
Library of Congress
Monrovia, Liberia, 1825
Library of Congress
Jefferson, along with many other Americans, combined plans for emancipation with colonization―moving freed slaves outside the U.S. "I have seen no proposition so expedient . . . as that of emancipation of those [slaves] born after a given day, and of their education and expatriation at a proper age," Jefferson wrote in 1814.
He eventually decided that Africa was the best destination.