The Americas in the Spanish World Order: The Justification for Conquest in the Seventeenth Century by James Muldoon

Abstract

The Americas in the Spanish World Order: The Justification for Conquest in the Seventeenth Century. By James Muldoon. (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. 1994. Pp. xii, 239. $32.95.) This book is a careful summary and analysis of Juan de Solorzano Pereira's defense of Spain's title to the New World in his De Indiarum Jure (1629-1639), better known by scholars in its Spanish version, Politica indiana (1647). The work has long been regarded as an authoritative commentary on and digest of the Laws of the Indies. Muldoon's study concentrates on the second book of the first volume of De Indiarum Jure, dealing with the legitimacy of the Spanish conquest of America and assessing the ten basic arguments defenders of the conquest had offered the past to justify it. Muldoon observes that the format of the work Is that of a medieval legal treatise, posing questions, arranging arguments pro and con, citing authorities, and, finally, drawing conclusions in the manner of medieval scholastic philosophers and lawyers. Having surveyed the arguments in the literature on the debate, Solorzano rejected nine of the commonly stated Spanish titles to the New World, accepting only the tenth title, grounding Spanish possession of the Americas on Pope Alexander VI's grant. His intention, says Muldoon, to justify continued Spanish possession of the Americas and to provide a basis for opposing any attempts by other European rulers, Catholics or Protestants, to acquire territory in the New World without papal or Spanish permission. Muldoon notes, in this connection, that the event that prompted the writing of Solorzano's book was the publication of Hugo Grotius's famous Mare liberum (1609), which denied the legitimacy of Spain's and Portugal's claims to the newly discovered lands on the basis of the pal grant. Muldoon observes in passing that there are significant differences between the Latin and Spanish versions of Solorzano's work, reflecting a fairly common tendency of Spanish authors of the time to delete from vernacular texts material that crown or church might regard as subversive or offensive. In SoIorzano's case this may be more significant than Muldoon recognizes, and makes a comparison of his treatment of the dispute over Spain's titles to the New World in the two texts worthwhile. Thus in the De Indiarum Jure, Bartolome de Las Casas's positions on these matters, as summarized by Muldoon, are stated quite fairly and objectively, without minus, and Muldoon notes that Solorzano generally accepts Las Casas's views. …