Encomienda: Indigenous Labors Systems in New Spain

"...the moral pestilence invented by Spain"

Bartolome de LaCasa

“The organization of the Caribbean Indians as a labor pool was a matter of immediate and urgent concern for the Spanish colonists. The extremely hard labor necessary for the tasks of construction and subsistence, the unfamiliar and uncomfortable tropical environment, and Spaniards’ abhorrence of physical labor virtually ensured the exploitation of the local population.…Encomienda was an arrangement by which the inhabitants of a designated region or town were assigned to individual Spaniards as vassals. In exchange for protection and Christian instruction, the Indians were obligated to provide labor and services to their overlord.…Relocation of Indians for labor in mines, ranches and farms disrupted and recombined settlements. This probably led also to a general disintegration and breakdown in Hispaniola Arawak society.” 

Kathleen A. Deagan

“Spanish-Indian Interaction in Sixteenth-Century Florida and Hispaniola.”

“Spaniards who actually went to the new lands, though, had little interest in evangelization. Although often personally pious, they were more concerned with Indian labor than Indian souls.…In 1503 the monarchs provided…the encomienda system. Individual Spaniards became trustees of indigenous groups, promising to ensure their safety, freedom and religious instruction. In fine protection-racket style, Indians paid for Spanish “security” with their labor. The encomienda can be thought of as an attempt to answer the objections to slavery….By restricting the demands on Indians, the monarchs sought to reduce the incentive to revolt. It didn’t work. Both the Indians and the conquistadores disliked the encomienda system….Trustees loathed negotiating with the Taino leaders….The Taino came to view the system as…legal justification for slavery.”

Charles C. Mann
1493: Uncovering the New World Columbus Created

Responses to the Encomienda System 

The Valladolid debate (1550–1551) was the first moral debate in European history to discuss the rights and treatment of a colonized people by colonizers. Held in the Colegio de San Gregorio, in the Spanish city of Valladolid, it was a moral and theological debate about the colonization of the Americas, its justification for the conversion to Catholicism and more specifically about the relations between the European settlers and the natives of the New World. It consisted of a number of opposing views about the way natives were to be integrated into colonial life, their conversion to Christianity and their rights and obligations.

A controversial theologian, Dominican friar and Bishop of Chiapas Bartolomé de las Casas, argued that the Amerindians were free men in the natural order despite their practice of human sacrifices and other such customs, deserving the same consideration as the colonizers.^[1] Opposing this view were a number of scholars and priests including humanist scholar Juan Ginés de Sepúlveda, who argued that the human sacrifice of innocents, cannibalism, and other such "crimes against nature" were unacceptable and should be suppressed by any means possible including war.^[2]

Although both sides claimed to have won the disputation, there is no clear record supporting either interpretation. The affair is considered one of the earliest examples of moral debates about colonialism, human rights of colonized peoples and international relations in history. In Spain, it served to establish de las Casas as the primary, though controversial defender of the Indians.^[3] He and others contributed to the passing of the New Laws of 1542, which limited the encomienda system further.^[4] Though they did not fully reverse the situation, the laws achieved considerable improvement in the treatment of Indians and consolidated their rights granted by earlier laws.^[4] More importantly, the debate reflected a concern for morality and justice in 16th century Spain that only surfaced in other colonial powers centuries later.

Do you know who won the first morality debate about European colonization in the New World? Let’s take to look the Valladolid Debate of 1550, the first ethics debate of European colonization.

The Encomienda System

In the beginning of the 16th century, Spain begin the colonized many parts of the New World. To help with this colonization, Spain instituted the encomienda system, which allowed Spaniards the right to a section of land in the New World, but not only the right to the land- the labor of the indigenous population living on that land. So essentially, the Spaniard got the land and the people living on the land, and Spain said, “This is yours to own.” What was the result of this system? The result was widespread abuse and neglect of large population of endogenous people. And while the encomienda system did encourage colonization, not everyone involved thought was a good thing. Men like Bartolome de las Casas began to speak out against the encomienda system and its abuses. In fact, Casas was so successful in his public campaign against the encomienda system, that the king of Spain begin to take notice.

The Valladolid Debate

And by the mid-16th century, the king of Spain instituted reform laws which reformed the encomienda system to try to curve and end it’s most notorious abuses. However, just as people spoke out against the encomienda system, there were people speaking for it. A notable advocate for the encomienda system was Juan Sepulveda. The debate over the encomienda system became a very hot topic. And this debate raged on in Spain and in the New World. In fact, by 1550, the king of Spain began an investigation into the morality of Spanish colonization and the encomienda system itself. The king charged Bartolome de las Casas and Juan Sepulveda to debate in the Spanish court. And this debate would guide Spanish policy going forward. If the advocates for the encomienda system won, then that system would continue to be reinforced, but if people who spoke out against it won, then the encomienda system would start to be dismantled. It was a very important debate and the whole country watched it.

So what was Sepulveda’s argument for the encomienda system since its abuses were so well documented? Sepulveda sited the indigenous people’s history of cannibalism and human sacrifice as savage behaviors. And he said that this behavior was unfit for humans and that they needed a European master to rule over the them and show them the proper and ethical way to live. Essentially, Sepulveda was saying that the indigenous populations, because of their barbaric practices, were unfit to govern themselves and they needed a European government to rule over them. Bartolome on the other hand, argued that the native Americans were free men deserving of equal treatment. So who won the debate, and how did this influence Spain’s policy of colonization going forward? Both Bartolome and Sepulveda presented their arguments before a Spanish court. The court, after spending many months in deliberation, rendered an inconclusive verdict, meaning nobody won. This allowed both Bartolome and Sepulveda to claim victory in the debate, even though neither side was officially acknowledged as the winner. Bartolome saw no end of Spanish colonization of the New World, and Sepulveda didn’t see a resending of the new laws and to reform the encomienda system.

Legacy

Essentially, neither side won nor lost and not much changed after the debate. The current situation remained as is. While the outcome of the debate was inconclusive, it did established two important legacies. The first was that Bartolome de las Casas was officially recognized as protector of the Indians. And second, and more important to the context of world in U.S. history, the Valladolid debate was the first European debate about the morality of European colonization of new lands, and not only the colonization of those lands, but how the populations in those new lands should be treated.

http://academic-hub.blogspot.com/2013/03/bartolomeo-de-las-casas.html

https://abagond.wordpress.com/2015/10/14/the-valladolid-debate/