December 1972 | Volume 24, Issue 1 For some men the only
solution to the dilemma of blacks and whites together was for
the blacks to go back where they came from When, on August 14,
1862, President Abraham Lincoln spoke to a visiting “committee
of colored men” at the White House, it was already becoming
clear that one result of the War Between the States would be the
freeing of millions of slaves. Slavery was toppling under the
blows of war, and in just another month the President would
issue the preliminary version of the Emancipation Proclamation.
The “colored men” whom Lincoln addressed were free already; some
of them had been free all their lives. The President, however,
gave them no heartening affirmations of their equality. Instead,
he proposed to them the resettling of American blacks, either in
Africa or in Central or South America. “You are cut off,” he
reminded his visitors, “from many of the advantages which the
other race enjoy. The aspiration of men is to enjoy equality
with the best when free, b