American Colonization Society

The American Colonization Society (ACS) was an organization founded in 1816 to encourage and fund the emigration of free African Americans to a colony in Africa, which later became the nation of Liberia in 1847.

The society believed that free Black Americans could not achieve true freedom or equality in the United States due to racial tensions and that they would be better off in their own homeland in Africa.

Although presented as a benevolent alternative to slavery by some of its supporters, the ACS was criticized by many African Americans and abolitionists who viewed the idea of colonization as an attempt to remove Black people from the country.