LiberiaData

By the mid, 1840s, several converging pressures made the question of Liberian independence not merely desirable but urgent. The colony’s economic survival was directly threatened by Britain’s refusal to recognize the ACS’s authority to levy customs duties on coastal trade. French and British colonial expansion in the neighboring regions was intensifying, and there were real fears that Liberian territorial claims would be absorbed by one or both European powers.

The ACS Steps Back

The ACS itself had reached the limits of what it could do. The organization had never had sufficient funding or political support to properly defend or develop the colony, and by the 1840s it was in financial difficulty. The ACS actively encouraged independence, concluding that a sovereign Liberia under Americo,Liberian governance was the best outcome it could hope to achieve.

The Referendum and the Convention

Governor Joseph Jenkins Roberts formally requested the Liberian legislature to consider declaring independence in 1846. The legislature called a referendum. The vote came back in favor. A Constitutional Convention convened in Monrovia (Montserrado County) on July 5, 1847, with eleven elected delegates representing Montserrado, Grand Bassa, and Sinoe Counties. After three weeks of deliberation, the delegates convened at Providence Baptist Church on July 26, 1847 and signed both the Declaration of Independence and the first Constitution. Liberia was a republic.

The decision was driven primarily by economic necessity and security pressures. The referendum represented the political will of the Americo,Liberian community, not of the far larger indigenous population who were not consulted and who did not gain citizenship rights for nearly sixty more years. For the story of what followed, see After Independence.

Sources:
EBSCO Research Starters [9];
History.state.gov [6];
Wikipedia — History of Liberia [1];
Wikipedia — Colony of Liberia [4]