American Missionary Association

The American Missionary Association (AMA) was a Protestant-based abolitionist group founded on September 3, 1846 (178 years ago) (1846-09-03) in Albany, New York.

The main purpose of the organization was abolition of slavery, education of African Americans, promotion of racial equality, and spreading Christian values.

It played a major role during and after the Reconstruction Era in promoting education for blacks in the South by establishing numerous schools and colleges, as well as paying for teachers.

For instance, the abolitionist Owen Lovejoy was among the Congregational ministers of the AMA who helped start 115 anti-slavery churches in Illinois before the American Civil War, building on the strong westward migration of population to that area.

French was assigned to Port Royal, South Carolina, and went on a speaking tour with Robert Smalls, who famously escaped enslavement, as well as met with President Abraham Lincoln, Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton and Treasury Secretary Salmon P. Chase, jointly convincing them to allow blacks to serve in the Union military.

It was supervised by Horace James, a Congregational chaplain appointed by the Army as "Superintendent for Negro Affairs in the North Carolina District".

[9] Freedmen, historically free blacks (many of whom were "mulattoes" of mixed race), and white sympathizers alike believed that education was a priority for the newly freed people.

"[1] In addition, the AMA organized the Freedmen's Aid Society, which recruited northern teachers for the schools and arranged to find housing for them in the South.

In the mid-1870s, white Democrats began to regain control of state legislatures through violence and intimidation at the polls that suppressed Republican voting.

While the AMA became widely known in the United States for its work in opposition to slavery and in support of education for freedmen, it also sponsored and maintained missions in numerous nations overseas.