According to their plans, Congressman Charles Marsh, of Vermont, having made the necessary arrangements,[272] the colonizationists held on the next evening, December 21, 1816, in the Davis Hotel, a public meeting, attended by citizens of Washington, Georgetown, Alexandria, and other parts of the country. Among the men of note present, not heretofore mentioned, were Henry Clay, Francis S. Key, Bishop William Meade, John Randolph, and Judge Bushrod Washington.[273] Niles reports the attendance "numerous and respectable, and its proceedings fraught with interest."[274] The avowed object of the meeting was for the "purpose of considering the expediency and practicability of ameliorating the condition of the Free People of Color now in the United States, by providing a Colonial Retreat, either on this continent or that of Africa."[275] Henry Clay, the chairman of the meeting, pointed out in his remarks that no attempt was being made "to touch or agitate in the slightest degree, a delicate question, connected with another portion of the colored population of this country. It was not proposed to deliberate upon or consider at all, any question of emancipation, or that which was connected with the abolition of slavery. It was upon that condition alone he was sure, that many gentlemen from the South and West, whom he saw present, had attended, or could be expected to cooperate. It was upon that condition only that he himself had attended."[276] The principal address was delivered by Elias B. Caldwell, the Princeton schoolmate of Charles Fenton Mercer. He argued for the expediency and practicability of African colonization. It was expedient because the free blacks have a demoralizing influence on our civil institutions; they can never enjoy equality among the whites in America; only in a district by themselves will they ever be happy. To colonize them in America would invite the possibility of their making common cause with the Indians and border nations, and furnish an asylum for fugitives and runaway slaves. Africa seemed the best place to send them: there was a settlement already in Sierra Leone, the climate was agreeable to the colored man's constitution, they could live cheaply there, and above all other reasons, they could carry civilization and Christianity to the Africans. While the expense would be greater than that connected with a settlement on the American Continent yet, in order to make atonement for the wrongs done Africa, America should contribute to this object both from the treasury of the national government and from the purse of private individuals. With the promise of equality, a homestead, and a free passage, no black would refuse to go. In concluding his speech he said: "It is for us to make the experiment and the offers; we shall then, and not till then, have discharged our duty. It is a plan in which all interests, all classes, and descriptions of people may unite, in which all discordant