The sixteen members of the Board of Managers of the Virginia Colonization Society seek legislative assistance in settling free people of color on a "new plantation" in West Africa called "New Virginia." Free blacks are a degraded population, they argue, and emancipated slaves can not settle in neighboring states because of "countervailing regulations" prohibiting free persons of color from immigrating. Consequently, the free black population is growing too rapidly, standing at 55,000, or one-eighth of Virginia's entire black population. A new colony, well financed and supplied, would provide a solution to this problem.
Result: Referred to select committee.
Or you may view all people.
Repository: Library of Virginia, Richmond, Virginia
