Maryland State Colonization Society
[5] In an open letter to John Carey in 1845, published in Baltimore by the printer John Murphy, Richard Sprigg Steuart set out his views on the subject of slavery in Maryland: The colored man [must] look to Africa, as his only hope of preservation and of happiness ... it can not be denied that the question is fraught with great difficulties and perplexities, but ... it will be found that this course of procedure ... will ... at no very distant period, secure the removal of the great body of the African people from our State.
[6]The society proposed from the outset "to be a remedy for slavery", and declared in 1833: Resolved, That this society believe, and act upon the belief, that colonization tends to promote emancipation, by affording the emancipated slave a home where he can be happier than in this country, and so inducing masters to manumit who would not do so unconditionally ... [so that] at a time not remote, slavery would cease in the state by the full consent of those interested.
The Maryland State Colonization Society was seen as a remedy for slavery that would lead ultimately to emancipation by peaceful means.
The act appropriated funds of up to $20,000 a year, up to a total of $260,000, in order to commence the process of African colonization, a considerable expenditure by the standards of the time.
Free passage was offered, plus rent, 5 acres (20,000 m2) of land to farm, and low interest loans which would eventually be forgiven if the settlers chose to remain in Liberia.
[11] At the same time, measures were enacted to force freed slaves to leave the state, unless a court of law found them to be of such "extraordinary good conduct and character" that they might be permitted to remain.
Approximately 21 km (15 mi) further along the coast to the east, the Cavalla River empties into the sea, marking the border between Liberia and the Côte d'Ivoire.
Soon afterward, local tribes including the Grebo and the Kru attacked the State of Maryland in retaliation for its disruption of the slave trade.
[citation needed] Unable to maintain its own defense, Maryland appealed to Liberia, its more powerful neighbor, for help.
President Roberts sent military assistance, and an alliance of Marylanders and Liberian militia troops successfully repelled the local tribesmen.
[18] Marylanders might agree in principle that slavery could and should be abolished, but turning theory into practice would prove elusive, and the overall numbers of slaves remained stubbornly high.
As late as the early 1930s the Liberian elite continued to traffic in human cargo from the country's interior, selling African labor on to Spanish plantations on the island of Fernando Po, where they were held in conditions akin to slavery.
