{
  "id": "confirmacion-en-perjuicio-de-tercero-y-el-caso-de-cartagena",
  "type": "entity",
  "name": "A royal confirmation obtained behind a pending lawsuit: the Council of the Indies rules against an encomendero of Cartagena",
  "summary": "An encomendero of Cartagena lost his encomienda to a rival who appealed the governor's grant to the Council of the Indies and won twice over. He then produced a royal confirmation of the same encomienda, obtained from that Council while the suit was running. The Council held it worthless: it gave him no new right and was void as subreptitious, because it never mentioned the pending suit or the third party's claim. The treatise prints the rule and the opposite case with it.",
  "locale": "en",
  "tags": [
    "colonial-law",
    "law",
    "colonial-institutions",
    "encomienda",
    "courts",
    "due-process",
    "litigation",
    "americas",
    "spanish-empire",
    "new-granada",
    "seventeenth-century",
    "legal-history"
  ],
  "relations": [
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "confirmacion-de-las-encomiendas-en-el-consejo-de-indias"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "narrativa-y-calidades-de-los-titulos-de-encomienda"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "leon-pinelo-tratado-de-confirmaciones-reales-1630"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "encomienda"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "consejo-de-indias"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "solorzano-politica-indiana"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "citacion-y-privacion-de-encomiendas-por-ausencia"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "audiencia-de-charcas"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "real-audiencia-de-la-nueva-galicia"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "examen-y-etica-de-los-abogados-de-las-indias"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "escribanos-de-las-indias"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "juicio-de-residencia"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "mugeres-y-encomiendas-de-las-indias"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "recopilacion-de-leyes-de-indias"
    }
  ],
  "questions": [
    "Could a royal confirmation defeat a lawsuit already pending in the Indies?",
    "What happened when an encomendero confirmed his grant during litigation?",
    "Did the clauses motu proprio and cierta ciencia have any force in the law of the Indies?",
    "Who could oppose the grant of an encomienda in a colonial court?",
    "Did heirs of an encomienda need a royal confirmation?"
  ],
  "claims": [
    {
      "id": "c1",
      "text": "This entry is scoped to §§35-40 of libro III, capítulo XXVIII of Juan de Solórzano Pereira's Política Indiana, the whole of page 395 of the 1736 impression: the third of the inferences the chapter draws from the requirement that encomiendas be confirmed at the Council of the Indies, namely that a confirmation is never presumed to prejudice a third party. The institutional history of the requirement, and the question of what the granting title had to narrate, are carried by two companion entries and nothing here rests on them.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-confirmacion-y-tercero"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c2",
      "text": "The rule is stated as a rule about being heard before you lose. At §35 \"el Principe, que confirma estas Encomiendas, ò en forma comun, ò en forma especifica, nunca se presume, que quiere perjudicar al derecho de qualquier tercero, que aya sobre ellas puesto pleyto à los encomendados en las Audiencias de las Indias, ò que justamente le pueda poner, y no pareciere haver sido citado para pedir, y sacar la confirmacion, y bastantemente oído, y vencido antes de darla. Lo qual se funda en que assi como qualquier gracia, merced, y privilegio de los Principes se entiende concederse sin perjuicio de tercero segun la regla vulgar de el Derecho.\" The opponent's protection is procedural: he must be summoned to the confirmation, heard in it, and beaten in it, before a grant made over his head can stand.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-confirmacion-y-tercero"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c3",
      "text": "The clauses that a grantee would reach for to escape that rule are refused, and the refusal is unusually blunt about how such documents were produced. At §35 this holds \"aunque la confirmacion se diga, que se ha hecho, ò dado de motu propio, cierta ciencia, de plenitud de potestad, y con derogacion de lo que pudiere obstar en contrario; porque todas estas clausulas se presumen puestas fuera de la intencion del Principe, y de estilo de las Secretarías ò sus Notarios, como lo dicen muchos DD. antiguos, y modernos, y mejor que todos Baldo, aconsejando, que por esta causa, y por los muchos pleytos, que cada dia se engendran de el estilo de poner tales clausulas, se havian de mandar quitar del todo en estos Despachos, ò que por lo menos no se frequentassen tanto.\" The most emphatic language a royal document could carry is treated as clerical boilerplate that the chancery ought to stop writing.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-confirmacion-y-tercero"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c4",
      "text": "The practice the rule was aimed at is described, and the treatise names it as a manoeuvre. At §36 this \"es conveniente tener advertido contra algunos, que se dan mucha prisa à sacar los Titulos de sus Encomiendas, y los presentan en el Consejo, sin hacer mencion, que quedan litigiosas, ò contradichas, ò del derecho de otros terceros, para tener ganada, antes que ellos lleguen, la confirmacion, pensando, que con esto mejoran su causa. Porque deben saber, que no les puede servir de nada esta prisa, y anticipacion: pues siempre, que pareciere el tercero, y pidiere ser oído en razon de su derecho, debe ser admitido\", adding on Cancerio that the prince is never understood to wish to prejudice a third party's right in rem or ad rem, and that he is presumed to have been deceived if the contrary results from the privilege.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-confirmacion-y-tercero"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c5",
      "text": "The chapter then reports a case decided in the Council of the Indies while the author sat on it, and the facts are given in one sentence. At §37 \"Y estos dias se ofreció este punto en el Consejo en la causa de un Encomendero de Cartagena, à quien un Opositor movió pleyto sobre la Encomienda, que el Governador le concedió, apelando de su injusta provision al Consejo, donde tuvo en favor dos sentencias en Vista, y Revista, de que ganó Executoria, y queriendo tratar de valerse de ella, el contrario se opuso, mostrando tener confirmada su Encomienda por el Consejo, y querian sus Abogados ser oídos de nuevo contra la Executoria por este pretexto, alegando, que no se havia presentado en el pleyto, y que le prestaba excepcion legitima para defenderse, aunque sobrevino por causa de futuro; y que no se puede decir atentado, el procurar esta gracia de la confirmacion del Principe, para mas conservar, y assegurar su derecho: como lo dicen Bartolo, y otros.\" A rival candidate for an encomienda appealed the governor's grant to Madrid and won it twice there; the holder's answer was a confirmation obtained meanwhile from the same Council.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-confirmacion-y-tercero"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c6",
      "text": "The Council's decision is reported flatly and the reasoning is the chapter's own rule applied. At §38 \"Pero sin embargo, el Consejo tuvo por llano, que no le aprovechaba esta confirmacion, para armar nuevo pleyto: y assi mandó se repeliesse la peticion, en que lo intentaba: porque como consta de lo referido, la dicha confirmacion no pudo dar nuevo derecho à este Encomendero, y caso, que aun por si pudiera añadir alguno, era nula, y subrepticia, por no haver hecho mención de la litependente, y del perjuicio de tercero\", and the Abad and others are quoted in terms: \"Que el privilegio, ò qualquier otro derecho, que sobreviene por gracia, ò concession del Principe sobre pleyto pendiente, no obra, ni ayuda en cosa alguna al que le consigue; y mucho menos contra sentencia passada en cosa juzgada, pues entonces queda cerrada la puerta à todo recurso.\" A royal act obtained without disclosing a pending suit was held to be worth nothing against the judgment in that suit.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-confirmacion-y-tercero"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c7",
      "text": "The opposite case is then put on the record in the same breath, and it is the limit that keeps the doctrine honest. At §39 \"Pero si dieramos caso, en que pendiente el pleyto se ganára la confirmacion, no en forma comun; sino especifica, y con relacion de él, y de su estado, y de las pretensiones del tercero, y mostrando el Principe, que era su voluntad, que fuesse preferido el nombrado por el Governador, seria forzoso obedecer su mandato, y cessaria el pleyto, y le aprovecharia este derecho, aunque aya sobrevenido litependente.\" The protection is against concealment, not against the king: a prince who is told about the suit and decides it anyway is obeyed. The claim as the chapter leaves it is therefore narrower than a modern reader might take it to be.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-confirmacion-y-tercero"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c8",
      "text": "The last inference of the sequence exempts the ordinary heir. At §40 \"los que no entran en Encomiendas por nueva gracia; sino por la via de succession, como hijos, nietos, y mugeres à falta de ellos … no están obligados à pedir, y llevar confirmacion de ellas, porque cessan en este caso las razones, que obligaron à introducirla: pues no las consiguen por la eleccion de los Governadores; sino por la providencia, y llamamientos de la ley. Y assi no se les despacha nuevo titulo, sino el de su antecessor, que entró à gozar la primera vida, y la confirmacion, que en él intervino, aprovecha à todos sus descendientes, que de él tienen causa\", as Dino and others teach and as Antonio de León observes in these very terms. The audit bites on the exercise of colonial patronage, not on succession, because succession is not a choice anyone made.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-confirmacion-y-tercero"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c9",
      "text": "What this entry establishes and what it does not. It establishes that the law of the Indies as stated in this chapter held a royal confirmation of an encomienda never to prejudice a third party who had a suit pending in the Audiencias of the Indies and had not been cited and heard; that the clauses motu propio, cierta ciencia and plenitud de potestad were given no weight, being presumed the style of the secretaries; that hurrying a title to the Council without disclosing that it was litigious was a known manoeuvre and a futile one; that in a case decided in the Council while the author sat on it, an encomendero of Cartagena who produced such a confirmation against an Executoria already won by his opponent had his petition repelled and the confirmation held null and subreptitious; and that an heir succeeding by law needed no confirmation of his own. It establishes nothing more about that case. No record of the suit was opened: the encomendero and the Opositor are not named on the page and are not named here, the governor is only \"el Governador\", the date is only \"estos dias\", and what became of the encomienda afterwards is not stated. The report comes from a man who sat on the Council that gave the judgment and who does not say that he heard the cause. Nothing on this page says anything about the Indians of the encomienda in dispute, or whether the outcome made any difference to them, and this entry does not assert that it did or did not.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-confirmacion-y-tercero"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    }
  ],
  "takeaways": [],
  "faqs": [],
  "evidence_tier": "primary",
  "evidence": {
    "level": "industry_observation",
    "source_types": [
      "paper"
    ]
  },
  "moat_flag": false,
  "winning_edge": "Colonial Spanish America is routinely described as a system in which a royal favour, once obtained, settled everything. This entry prints a decided case in which it did not. A man passed over for an encomienda at Cartagena appealed the governor's grant across the Atlantic, won two judgments and an Executoria in the Council of the Indies, and was met with a royal confirmation of the same encomienda that his rival had obtained from that same Council while the suit was running — and the Council held the confirmation worthless, null and subreptitious for concealing the pending suit. Around that the chapter supplies the doctrine in its own words: that the emphatic clauses of a royal despatch, motu propio and cierta ciencia and plenitud de potestad, are presumed to be the notaries' house style and outside the prince's intention, with Baldo quoted advising that they be struck out of such documents altogether. What makes the object usable rather than flattering is that the chapter states the opposite case on the same page — a confirmation reciting the suit and the third party's claims, with the prince showing he meant to prefer the governor's nominee, \"seria forzoso obedecer\" — so the protection is shown to be against concealment and not against the crown. And it states what it cannot show: no record of the suit was opened, nobody in it is named on the page, and nothing there says what any of it meant for the Indians of the encomienda concerned.",
  "confidence": 0.85,
  "last_verified": "2026-09-16",
  "media": [],
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    "name": "A royal confirmation obtained behind a pending lawsuit: the Council of the Indies rules against an encomendero of Cartagena",
    "description": "An encomendero of Cartagena lost his encomienda to a rival who appealed the governor's grant to the Council of the Indies and won twice over. He then produced a royal confirmation of the same encomienda, obtained from that Council while the suit was running. The Council held it worthless: it gave him no new right and was void as subreptitious, because it never mentioned the pending suit or the third party's claim. The treatise prints the rule and the opposite case with it.",
    "url": "https://hispanic-legacy.com/k/confirmacion-en-perjuicio-de-tercero-y-el-caso-de-cartagena",
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    "dateModified": "2026-09-16",
    "citation": [
      {
        "@type": "CreativeWork",
        "name": "Política Indiana, libro III, capítulo XXVIII, §§35-40 — a confirmation is never presumed to prejudice a third party, and the case of the encomendero of Cartagena decided in the Council of the Indies: the rule that a third party who has a suit pending in the Audiencias of the Indies must be cited, heard and defeated before the confirmation is given; the refusal to let the clauses motu propio, cierta ciencia and plenitud de potestad carry any weight, because they are presumed to be the style of the secretaries and outside the prince's intention, with Baldo's advice that they be struck out of such despatches altogether; the warning against holders who hurry their titles to the Council without mentioning that they are litigious or contradicted; the suit of an unnamed encomendero of Cartagena whose Opositor appealed the governor's provision to the Council, won in Vista and Revista and took out an Executoria, and against whom the holder produced a confirmation obtained meanwhile; the Council's ruling that the confirmation gave him no new right and was null and subreptitious for making no mention of the pending suit or of the prejudice to a third party; the honest statement of the opposite case, that a confirmation granted in specific form with the suit and the third party's claims recited would have had to be obeyed; and the rule that those entering by succession need no confirmation",
        "url": "https://books.google.com/books?id=huEykw_YtzYC&pg=PA395"
      }
    ],
    "@type": "Article",
    "headline": "A royal confirmation obtained behind a pending lawsuit: the Council of the Indies rules against an encomendero of Cartagena"
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}