Culture 15

Whereas our ancestors (not of choice) were the first successful cultivators of the wilds of America, we their descendants feel ourselves entitled to participate in the blessings of her luxuriant soil… We will never separate ourselves voluntarily from the slave population of this country; they are our brethren by the ties of consanguinity, of suffering and of wrong.

Resolution of assembled free blacks “A Voice from Philadelphia. Philadelphia, January, 1817” in William Lloyd Garrison, Thoughts on African Colonization: Or an Impartial Exhibition of the Doctrines, Principles and Purposes of the American Colonization Society (Boston, 1831).

Resolution of assembled free blacks, Bethel AME Church, Philadelphia, January 15, 1817

Culture or cultivation are also used to refer to the improvement of the soil for agriculture. Uncultivated soil is considered "wild", as in this quote which comes from a gathering of free Blacks. They opposed moving to West Africa because they wished to contribute to the cultivation of American soil. Slave owners saw free Blacks as a threat because they might inspire those still enslaved to revolt; hence they were to be shipped to the yet to be created Liberia. However some abolitionists (opponents of slavery) also supported the move to Liberia, viewing it as an opportunity for emancipation (see History Today, April 4, 2020).

*History Today (Angela Thompsell, 04.04.2020): The Foundations of Liberia.

1817