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Throughout
its history, the Republic of Liberia has had a special relationship with the United
States. The bond between the two nations stretches back nearly 200 years, but
has also led to cultural tensions within Liberia itself. Much
of Liberia's political turmoil can be traced back to the long-standing friction
between indigenous Africans and Americo-Liberians, descendents of emancipated
slaves and freeborn African Americans who settled in the region and came to dominate
the country for the next 130 years.
 In
1816, a group made up of Quakers and slaveholders formed the American
Colonization Society (ACS) in Washington, DC, with the purpose
of sending African Americans back to Africa. Supporters of the
ACS had radically different reasons for forming the groups. The
Quakers hoped that the African Americans would have a better chance
to live free in Africa while the slaveholders wished to avoid
bloody slave rebellions like those that occurred in what is present
day Haiti.
Initially
the ACS sent black settlers and white society representatives, who would govern
the territory for the first two and a half decades, to British-controlled Sierra
Leone in 1820. But the harsh conditions lead to high death rates and the ACS petitioned
the British government to move the group. Later the group traveled to Liberia
where reluctant indigenous leaders were compelled, some say by threat of force,
to sell their land to the settlers. The
first group of 86 volunteer black emigrants along with their white agents arrived
on Cape Montserrado in 1822. The
early years were difficult. The settlers faced opposition from the many ethnic
groups who were living in the area. The indigenous Africans resented the growing
western-style settlements, the attempts by the settlers to curb the lucrative
slave trade, and efforts to spread Christianity and other Western values. While
the ACS was settling in Liberia, other U.S. slave states that wished to rid themselves
of freed African Americans established their own colonies in Liberia. Often, slaves
were only emancipated after they agreed to emigrate to Africa. Eventually, most
of these independent colonies merged with the original ACS settlement. The
original settlement was renamed Monrovia, after then-American president James
Monroe, and the entire colony became the Republic of Liberia, or the "land
of freedom" in 1824. In
1847, Liberia declared its independence from the United States after Britain refused
to accept the sovereignty of Liberia and the right of the ACS to levy taxes. Britain,
rather than oppose the move, became one of the first countries to recognize the
new state. The United States would not formally recognize the nation until 1862,
during the U.S. Civil War.
 The
Americo-Liberians established a nation that in many ways mirrored
the one they had left. The flag echoed the U.S. flag with contrasting
red and white stripes and a blue square in the corner with one
white star. The country's constitution and political structure
were closely based on the American model.
But
they also replicated a social structure in which local Africans could not acquire
full social, civic or political participation-- similar to the oppressive anti-African
American rules that prompted many to leave the U.S. to begin with. The indigenous
peoples of Liberia did not obtain the right to vote and participate in elections
until 1946. This
political and social dominance continued until 1980, when Samuel K. Doe, a Liberian
of non-American descent, assassinated President William Tolbert, the last fully
Americo-Liberian leader.
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Compiled by Anne Schleicher for the Online NewsHour
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