Rival racial theories converged to justify colonization.

Evidence

Mercer, Finley, and the colonizationists they inspired ended up being the ideological children of an odd couple who had disliked each other: Thomas Jefferson and Samuel Stanhope Smith. The latter endorsed the cause before his 1819 death. While Smith believed that Black people were capable of Whiteness, Jefferson insisted that they were incapable of achieving Whiteness in the United States. Colonization offered an alternative that both men could embrace. — Ibram X. Kendi, Stamped from the Beginning, 387

Categorization

• XREF: Crucial for Kendi’s scheme: both assimilationist (Smith: Blacks capable of Whiteness) and segregationist (Jefferson: Blacks incapable of Whiteness) positions converge on the same racist policy — showing assimilationism is itself a racist position.
• DEFINE: Perfect specimen of how two opposed theories (assimilationist vs. segregationist) produce the same discriminatory policy, the heart of the reader’s testing goal.