to his scheme for a modern system of public schools the
training of the slaves in industrial and agricultural branches to equip
them for a higher station in life. He believed, however, that the blacks
not being equal to the white race should not be assimilated and should
they be free, they should, by all means, be colonized afar off.[15]
Thinking that the western lands might be so used, he said in writing to
James Monroe in 1801: "A very great extent of country north of the Ohio
has been laid off in townships, and is now at market, according to the
provisions of the act of Congress.... There is nothing," said he, "which
would restrain the State of Virginia either in the purchase or the
application of these lands."[16] Yet he raised the question as to whether
the establishment of such a colony within our limits and to become a part
of the Union would be desirable. He thought then of procuring a place
beyond the limits of the United States on our northern boundary, by
purchasing the Indian lands with the consent of Great Britain. He then
doubted that the black race would live in such a rigorous climate.

This plan did not easily pass from the minds of the friends of the slaves,
for in 1805 Thomas Brannagan asserted in his _Serious Remonstrances_
that the government should appropriate a few thousand acres of land at
some distant part of the national domains for the Negroes' accommodation
and support. He believed that the new State might be established upwards
of 2,000 miles from our frontier.[17] A copy of the pamphlet containing
this proposition was sent to Thomas Jefferson, who was impressed thereby,
but not having the courage to brave the torture of being branded as a
friend of the slave, he failed to give it his support.[18] The same
question was brought prominently before the public again in 1816 when
there was presented to the House of Representatives a memorial from the
Kentucky Abolition Society praying that the free people of color be
colonized on the public lands. The committee to whom the memorial was
referred for consideration reported that it was expedient to refuse the
request on the ground that, as such lands were not granted to free white
men, they saw no reason for granting them to others.[19]

Some Negro slaves unwilling to wait to be carried or invited to the
Northwest Territory escaped to that section even when it was controlled by
the French prior to the American Revolution. Slaves who reached the West