The US Seriously Considered Resettling African-Americans Here. African American soldiers in the Philippines Aside from its expansionist campaigns, another controversy that hounded the US was its discriminatory treatment of its own African-American citizens. Although the American Civil War of 1861-65 had effectively abolished slavery and granted them citizenship, black people still suffered discrimination. In fact many, segregationist politicians and advocates actually called for African-Americans to be relocated in the faraway territories the US had acquired, the Philippines being one such area under consideration. According to the foremost relocation proponent Alabama Senator John T. Morgan, the plan would bring back black people to their “natural” habitat and finally solve the “negro problem” in the US. At the same time, he argued that black people could serve as role models to the Filipinos by showing them the benefits of being under American rule. Probably the only thing crazier than the proposal was the fact that US President Theodore Roosevelt actually sent a commissioner to the archipelago to conduct a feasibility study. Although the commissioner later returned with a positive report, the plan was never carried out. For one, Governor-General William Howard Taft remarked that even the Filipinos considered themselves superior to black people. Second, those who opposed the plan pointed to the financial and logistical nightmare if it was ever carried out. Lastly, it was technically illegal to relocate the African-Americans since they were US citizens and could not be forcibly shipped out without their consent.
Posted on: Tue, 11 Nov 2014 16:30:13 +0000
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