America: A history

by Robert Mackenzie

A few years later, when the Indians had gained some experience of the ways of the Spaniards, they began to shun the presence of their new masters. They shunned them, wrote Las Casas, “as naturally as the bird shuns the hawk.” It was reported by the Governor, Ovando, that this policy interfered with the spread of the faith as well as with the prosperity of the settlements. 1503 A.D. He received from the Spanish Monarchs authority to compel the Indians to work for such wages as he chose to appoint, and also to attend mass and receive instruction. The liberty of the Indians was asserted; but in presence of the conditions under which they were now to live, liberty was impossible. Ovando lost no time in acting on his instructions. He distributed large numbers of Indians, with no other obligation imposed upon those who received them than that the savages should be taught the holy Catholic faith.

Nov. 1504 A.D. Next year the good Queen Isabella died. She had loved the Indians, and her influence sufficed to restrain the evils which were ready to burst upon them. Her death greatly emboldened the colonists in their oppressive treatment of their unhappy servants. The search for gold had become eminently successful, and there arose a vehement demand for labourers. King Ferdinand was a reasonably humane man, but the welfare of his Indian subjects did not specially concern him. There were many men who had done him service which called for acknowledgment. The King had little money to spare, but a grant of Indians was an acceptable reward. That was the coin in which the claims of expectants were now satisfied. The King soothed his conscience by declaring that such grants were not permanent, but might be revoked at his pleasure. Meantime the population of the islands wasted with terrible rapidity.

In course of time the colonists desired that their rights should be placed upon a more stable footing, and they sent messengers to the King to request that their Indians should be given to them in perpetuity, or at least for two or three generations. 1512 A.D. Their prayer was not granted; but the King summoned a Junta, and the Indians became, for the first time, the subjects of formal legislation. The legality of the system under which they were forced to labour was now clearly established. In other respects the laws were intended, for the most part, to ameliorate the condition of the labourers. But it was only at a few points the new regulations could be enforced. By most of the colonists they were disregarded.

Thirty miserable years passed, during which, although the incessant labours of Las Casas gained occasional successes, the colonists exercised their cruel pleasure upon the native population. The islands were almost depopulated, and negroes were being imported from Africa to take the place of the labourers who had been destroyed. Mexico had fallen, with a slaughter which has been estimated by millions. Of the numerous cities which Cortes passed on his way to Mexico, “nothing,” says a report addressed to the King, “is now remaining but the sites.” In Peru it was asserted by an eye-witness that one-half or two-thirds of men and cattle had been destroyed. The survivors of these unparalleled calamities had fallen into a condition of apathy and indifference from which it was impossible to arouse them. The conquerors had not yet penetrated deeply into the heart of the continent; but they had visited its coasts, and wherever they had gone desolation attended their steps.

1542 A.D. The Spanish Government had made many efforts to curb the lawless greed and cruelty of the conquerors. Now a Junta was summoned and a new code of laws enacted. Again the freedom of the Indians was asserted, and any attempt to enslave them forbidden. The colonists had assumed that the allotments of Indians made to them were not subject to recall. But it was now declared that all such allotments were only for the single life of the original possessor; at his death they reverted to the Crown. Yet further: compulsory service was abolished, and a fixed tribute took its place.

Official persons were sent to enforce these laws in Mexico and Peru. But the Junta had not sufficiently considered the temper of the provinces. It was found that Mexico would not receive the new laws, which were therefore referred to the Government for reconsideration. The Viceroy, who carried the laws to Peru, after bringing the country to the verge of rebellion, was taken prisoner by the local authorities and shipped homewards to Spain. The laws which the high-handed conquerors thus decisively rejected were soon after annulled by an order of the King.

The Spanish Government was thus baffled in its efforts to terminate the ruinous control which Spanish colonists exercised over the natives. The duration of that control was gradually extended. In seventeen years it crept up to three lives. Fifty years later, after many years of agitation, the fourth life was gained. Twenty years after, the still unsatisfied heirs of the conquerors demanded that a fifth life should be included in the grant; but here they were obliged to accept a compromise. The system continued in force for two hundred and fifty years, and was not abolished till near the close of the eighteenth century.

But although the Government yielded to the clamour of its turbulent subjects, in so far as the prolongation of Spanish control was concerned, it was inflexible in its determination to modify the quality of that control. The prohibition of compulsory labour was firmly adhered to. The legal right of the conquerors was restricted to the exaction of a fixed tribute from their subject Indians. This tribute must be paid in money or in some product of the soil, but not compounded for by personal service. The Indians might hire themselves as labourers, under certain regulations and for certain specified wages, but this must be their own voluntary act. For many years the Spaniards yielded a most imperfect obedience to these salutary restrictions, but gradually, as the machinery of administration spread itself over the continent, the law was more strictly enforced.

The Spanish Government is entitled to the praise of having done its utmost to protect the native populations. In the early days of the conquest, Queen Isabella watched over their interests with a special concern for their conversion to the true faith. As years passed, and the gigantic dimensions of the evil which had fallen on the Indians became apparent, her successors attempted, by incessant legislation, to stay the progress of the ruin which was desolating a continent. None of the other European Powers manifested so sincere a purpose to promote the welfare of a conquered people. The rulers of Spain were continually enacting laws which erred only in being more just and wise than the country in its disordered condition was able to receive. They continually sought to protect the Indians by regulations extending to the minutest detail, and conceived in a spirit of thoughtful and even tender kindness.[31] In all that the Government did or endeavoured to do it received eager support from the Church, whose record throughout this terrible history is full of wise foresight and noble courage in warning and rebuking powerful evil-doers. The Popes themselves interposed their authority to save the Indians. Las Casas, when he became a bishop, ordered his clergy to withhold absolution from men who held Indians as slaves. 1520 A.D. Once the King’s Preachers, of whom there were eight, presented themselves suddenly before the Council of the Indies and sternly denounced the wrongs inflicted upon the natives, whereby, said they, the Christian religion was defamed and the Crown disgraced. Gradually efforts such as these sufficed to mitigate the sorrows of the Indians; but for many years their influence was scarcely perceived. The spirit of the conquerors was too high for submission to any limitation of prerogatives which they had gained through perils so great; their hearts were too fierce, their orthodoxy too strict to admit any concern for the sufferings of unbelievers. They were followed by swarms of adventurers—brave, greedy, lawless. Success—unlooked for and dazzling—attended the search for gold. Conquest followed conquest with a rapidity which left hopelessly in arrear the efforts of Spain to supply government for the enormous dependencies suddenly thrown upon her care. Every little native community was given over to the tender mercies of a man who regarded human suffering with unconcern; who was animated by a consuming hunger for gold, and who knew that Indian labour would procure for him the gold which he sought. In course of years, the persistent efforts of the Government and the Church bridled the measureless and merciless rapacity of the Spanish colonists. But this restraint was not established till ruin which could never be retrieved had fallen on the Indians; till millions had perished, and the spirit of the survivors was utterly broken.