{"id":41647,"date":"2015-07-04T01:25:19","date_gmt":"2015-07-04T01:25:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mixedracestudies.org\/?p=41647"},"modified":"2015-07-04T01:25:19","modified_gmt":"2015-07-04T01:25:19","slug":"brown-theology-critical-race-theory-and-the-laws-of-burgos","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/?p=41647","title":{"rendered":"Brown Theology, Critical Race Theory, and the Laws of Burgos"},"content":{"rendered":"

Brown Theology, Critical Race Theory, and the Laws of Burgos<\/a><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Jesus for Revolutionaries<\/a>
\n2015-06-29<\/p>\n

Robert Chao Romero<\/a><\/strong>, Associate Professor of Chicana\/o Studies and Asian American Studies
\nUniversity of California, Los Angeles<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The fervent cries of Montesino soon reached the ears of King Ferdinand<\/a>.\u00a0\u00a0 On March 20, 1512, the king ordered Governor Diego Columbus<\/a> to silence Montesinos under penalty of repatriation to Spain (Hanke, 18).\u00a0\u00a0 On March 23, 1512, the Dominican Superior in Spain followed suit and likewise rebuked Montesinos and the rebellious monks for their irksome teaching.\u00a0 Undeterred, Montesinos held his ground.\u00a0 To break the impasse, both the colonists and Dominicans sent representatives to Spain to argue their positions before the royal court.\u00a0 The colonists appointed a Franciscan monk, Alonso del Espinal; the Dominicans selected Montesinos.\u00a0 (Hanke, 22, 23).\u00a0 Bewildered by the long list of abuses perpetrated against the natives, King Ferdinand convened a group of theologians and royal officials to examine the situation and to create laws which addressed the purported injustices.<\/p>\n

In support of the colonist\u2019s position, Friar Bernardo de Mesa asserted that the Indians should be subject to servitude because of their laziness.\u00a0 By forcing them to labor for Spaniards, de Mesa reasoned, it would \u201ccurb their inclinations and compel them to industry\u201d (Hanke, 23).\u00a0\u00a0 Drawing from Aristotle<\/a>, a second court preacher, Licentiate Gregorio argued that forced labor was justified because the Indians were \u201cnatural slaves.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to Aristotle in Book 1 of the Politics<\/em><\/a>, some human beings are born \u201cnatural slaves\u201d (Smith, 110; 1254a21-24).\u00a0 Natural slaves lack reason and have an aptitude for manual labor (Smith, 110; Politics, 1260a12; 3.1280a33-34).\u00a0 Moreover, Aristotle asserts, a slave may be properly regarded as part of his master\u2019s own body.\u00a0 (Smith, 110; Politics<\/em>, 1254b20-23).\u00a0\u00a0 In drawing from Aristotle\u2019s natural slavery argument, Gregorio initiated a line of twisted theological reasoning which would later be used to justify conquest and colonization of all of the Americas, as well the enslavement of millions of African slaves.\u00a0\u00a0 Because the diverse indigenous populations of North and South America were \u201cnatural slaves\u201d some would argue, it was morally acceptable to conquer their lands and force them to labor for enlightened Europeans.\u00a0 As \u201cnatural slaves,\u201d moreover, West Africans were less than human and therefore could be captured, shipped, and sold to Spanish, Portuguese, and English settlers.<\/p>\n

After meeting more than 20 times, the royal junta came to several seemingly contradictory conclusions:\u00a0 1. The Indians were free political subjects; 2. They were entitled to humane treatment;\u00a0 3.\u00a0 Nonetheless, they could be subject to compulsory labor for Spaniards; and, 4. The Indians should be forced to live in close proximity to the Europeans in order to allow for more effective religious inculcation and instruction.\u00a0 (Hanke, 23).\u00a0\u00a0 These principles became codified in the first racially discriminatory laws in the history of the Americas called the Laws of Burgos<\/a> (Hanke, 24)<\/strong>…<\/p>\n

Read the entire article here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Brown Theology, Critical Race Theory, and the Laws of Burgos Jesus for Revolutionaries 2015-06-29 Robert Chao Romero, Associate Professor of Chicana\/o Studies and Asian American Studies University of California, Los Angeles The fervent cries of Montesino soon reached the ears of King Ferdinand.\u00a0\u00a0 On March 20, 1512, the king ordered Governor Diego Columbus to silence […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,21,459,8,3015,820],"tags":[13291,20370,20369,20367,20368],"class_list":["post-41647","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","category-latincarib","category-history","category-media-archive","category-native-americans","category-religion","tag-jesus-for-revolutionaries","tag-laws-of-burgos","tag-robert-c-romero","tag-robert-chao-romero","tag-robert-romero"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41647","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=41647"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41647\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=41647"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=41647"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=41647"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}