Liberia: Description, History, Problems — John Shaqi
Liberia: Description, History, ProblemsStarr, Frederick
History
Liberia: Description, History, Problems
Starr, Frederick
Liberia
By this machine we can grade the coffee
satisfactorily as to size of grain desired.” If only Liberian planters
had equally kept pace with the treatment of their coffee harvest, the
market would not have suffered so severely as it has. The policy of this
mission is to locate a married couple as missionaries at interior points
separated from each other by considerable distances; these places are to
be stations and head-quarters within populations estimated at about
150,000 persons; it is a capital plan and should exercise wide
influence. In connection with the mission a store is conducted which not
only maintains itself, but leaves a profit of some hundreds of dollars
yearly; a tailor-shop, shoe-shop, a blacksmith-shop, and a doctor’s
office, are also maintained, which not only care for themselves, but add
somewhat to the income. On the whole, the work and plans of this mission
are markedly practical.
The last mission in order of establishment is the African Methodist
Episcopal Church Mission, founded under Bishop Turner. It has been
successful under the direction of Bishop Turner, Bishop Moore, and
Bishop Shaffer. Its superintendent is the Rev. L. C. Curtis; it has five
church buildings, 16 ordained and 3 unordained preachers, 3 missionary
teachers, 501 members. It has an industrial school with 100 acres of
land on the St. Paul’s River. It is the only one of all the missions
which originates with colored men and which is carried through without
white assistance.
GOVERNMENT.--1. The Declaration of Independence of Liberia was adopted
on July 26, 1847. It is a human document of extraordinary interest. As a
basis for it, the declarers state their case in the following words: “We
the people of the Republic of Liberia, were originally inhabitants of
the United States of North America. In some parts of that country we
were debarred by law from all rights and privileges of men--in other
parts, public sentiment, more powerful than law, ground us down. We were
everywhere shut out from all civil offices. We were excluded from all
participation in the government. We were taxed without our consent. We
were compelled to contribute to the resources of the country, which gave
us no protection. We were made a separate and distinct class, and
against us every avenue of improvement was effectually closed. Strangers
from all lands, of a color different from ours, were preferred before
us. We uttered our complaints, but they were unattended to, or met only
by alleging the peculiar institution of the country. All hope of a
favorable change in our country was thus wholly extinguished in our
bosoms, and we looked about with anxiety for some asylum from the deep
degradation.” The whole document is well worth reading.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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