{ "id": "retencion-de-las-indias-y-el-pecado-de-abandonarlas", "type": "entity", "name": "Retention, not conquest: the argument that Spain could not lawfully give the Indies back, and the authorities cited for it", "summary": "Política Indiana libro I capítulo XI §§20-28 moves the question from acquiring the Indies to keeping them, where the law favours possession and a probable opinion suffices. §22 holds that the kings could not abandon them \"sin pecado\" — the converted would apostatise — and §23 that restitution ceases once populations are mixed, citing Navarre and, at footnote (39), the Bishop of Chiapa. §24 calls the remaining debate envy of the Spanish nation.", "locale": "en", "tags": [ "colonial-law", "law-of-the-indies", "legal-history", "jurisprudence", "international-law", "canon-law", "spanish-empire", "americas", "seventeenth-century", "eighteenth-century", "conquest", "books", "europe" ], "relations": [ { "rel": "related", "target": "prescripcion-y-titulos-concurrentes-de-las-indias" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "dominio-o-tutela-en-la-concesion-pontificia" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "intimacion-de-la-autoridad-del-papa-a-los-indios" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "mare-clausum-y-la-navegacion-exclusiva-a-las-indias" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "feudo-de-la-iglesia-y-la-licencia-de-los-reyes" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "titulo-de-la-infidelidad-de-los-indios" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "bula-de-alexandro-vi-en-romance" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "solorzano-politica-indiana" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "bartolome-de-las-casas" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "vitoria-relectio-de-indis-1557" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "school-of-salamanca" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "valladolid-debate" }, { "rel": "related", "target": "acosta-de-procuranda-indorum-salute-1588" } ], "questions": [ "Did Spanish jurists argue that Spain could not give the Indies back?", "What did Solórzano say about restitution of unjustly occupied kingdoms?", "Was Las Casas cited in support of Spanish retention of the Indies?", "How did probabilism enter the law of the Indies?", "Why did the Política Indiana treat retention differently from conquest?" ], "claims": [ { "id": "c1", "text": "The chapter changes the question, and the change is the whole argument. §20 of Política Indiana libro I capítulo XI, page 46 of the 1736 Madrid impression: \"Y esto procede mucho mas llanamente, quando se trata, no yá de adquirir, sino de retener lo adquirido, en que siempre todas las leyes admiten mayor latitud; y en causas, que aun en sí puedan recibir dudas, y variedad de opiniones, quieren que se siga, la que favorece à la possession.\" What had been a disputed question about the justice of the conquest becomes an undisputed one about the law of possession.", "sources": [ "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-retencion-y-abandono" ], "confidence": 0.9 }, { "id": "c2", "text": "§21 supplies the two rules that do the work, and the second is probabilism applied to an empire: \"Por donde solemos decir, que el estatuto, que prohibe el adquirir alguna cosa, si particularmente no expressa lo contrario, no es visto prohibir la retencion de ella. Y que para retener, y que uno no deba ser desposseido de lo adquirido, ni peque en no dexarlo, basta que estrive en opinion probable.\" A merely probable opinion is enough to keep the Indies and to escape sin in not relinquishing them — the standard for retention is set lower than the standard for taking.", "sources": [ "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-retencion-y-abandono" ], "confidence": 0.9 }, { "id": "c3", "text": "§22 turns the permission into a duty. It states that all agree that even if the kings \"quisieran voluntariamente dexar las Indias, y abdicar de sí el derecho, ò dominio, que tienen, y exercen en ellas, no lo pudieran hacer sin pecado\". The reasons given are that it would be \"faltar à lo prometido à la Iglesia, al amparo de los Indios, yá convertidos, que sin su cuidado apostatarian, y bolverian à su Idolatría, y perversas costumbres\", and that for want of them the pope could assign another Christian prince to the charge, \"segun la opinion del glorioso Santo Thomás, seguida comunmente por Theologos, y Canonistas\". Withdrawal is not merely unnecessary; it is forbidden.", "sources": [ "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-retencion-y-abandono" ], "confidence": 0.9 }, { "id": "c4", "text": "The authorities the page attaches to that duty are the ones usually cited against Spanish dominion. Footnote (36), keyed to the words \"no lo pudieran hacer sin pecado\", reads: \"Chiap. advers. Sepulved. fol. 54. & in tract. Comprobat. fol. 2. Victor. de Ind. Insulan. relect. 2. n. 13. & 14. Soto, Greg. Lopez, Cordub. omninò videndus, & alij plures apud Me.\" The Bishop of Chiapa against Sepúlveda, the Comprobación, Vitoria's second relectio on the Indies, Soto and Córdoba are marshalled by the crown's jurist as authority for the proposition that Spain may not leave. That these are the guardianship authorities of the earlier dispute is this corpus's reading of the footnote; the footnote itself gives only the names and folios, and none of the works was opened here.", "sources": [ "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-retencion-y-abandono" ], "confidence": 0.85 }, { "id": "c5", "text": "§23 is the hardest paragraph in the run and it is given here in full, because an entry that omitted it would misrepresent the chapter. It adds an opinion \"no menos comun, y segura, que enseña, que aun en los Reynos injustamente ocupados, cessa la obligacion de restituirlos, quando yá están mezclados con otros, que legitimamente posseen, sin cuyo notable daño, quiebra, y jactura, y la de su estado, no se podrian restituir aquellos: como hablando generalmente, y poniendo exemplo en el Reyno de Navarra\". The doctrine is that time and intermarriage extinguish the duty of restitution even where the original occupation was unjust.", "sources": [ "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-retencion-y-abandono" ], "confidence": 0.9 }, { "id": "c6", "text": "The same paragraph names, for the Indies specifically, the one authority a reader would least expect: \"Y en terminos terminantes de nuestras Indias, el Obispo de Chiapa, con ser, el que mas escrupulos ha movido cerca de ellas, y otros, que le siguen, assi hablando de ellas, como en las Orientales.\" Footnote (39) gives the reference: \"Chiap. d. tract. Comprob. fol. 30. Victor. vbi sup. Acost. Matienz. Boter. Rebello, Freitas.\" The treatise is asserting that Las Casas — described in the same breath as the man who raised more scruples about the Indies than anyone — held that restitution ceases once populations are mixed. Whether he did is NOT established here: the Comprobación was not opened, the attribution is an opponent's footnote, and this corpus has not collated it.", "sources": [ "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-retencion-y-abandono" ], "confidence": 0.85 }, { "id": "c7", "text": "§24 disposes of the remaining debate by imputing a motive to it: \"De manera, que oy son inutiles, y escusadas las questiones, que mas por curiosidad, ò embidia de nuestra Nacion, que por otro fin mueven en esta materia algunos Hereges, como lo advierte Pedro Matheo, y novissimamente el P. Hurtado de Mendoza, referido, y seguido por el P. Diana, que expressamente dán nombre de embidia à semejantes disputas.\" Three authorities are cited for the proposition that to dispute the Spanish title is envy. The chapter that had stated its opponents' case in their own words at §2 here declines to hear it further.", "sources": [ "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-retencion-y-abandono" ], "confidence": 0.9 }, { "id": "c8", "text": "§25 extends the right from holding to fighting, and calls a foreign witness for it: the kings may \"no solo … retener las Indias; sino hacer guerra abierta à los Indios, que se les revelassen en ellas, ò à otros, que se las invadiessen, ò perturbassen: como por palabras expressas lo dice, y reconoce Juan Botero, con ser Autor estraño, en sus Relaciones Universales.\" The value placed on the witness is precisely that he is not Spanish. Botero's work was not opened here.", "sources": [ "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-retencion-y-abandono" ], "confidence": 0.85 }, { "id": "c9", "text": "§§26-27 explain why the grant had to be read at its widest. §26: the dominion had to be \"tan amplo, y absoluto … porque una materia tan grave, y essencial, como la de la conversion de tantos, y tan barbaros Infieles, requeria, que le tuviesse tal sobre ellos algun Principe Christiano, y no se pudiera introducir, ni conservar de otra suerte\". §27 closes the escape route left by the guardianship reading: \"Y quando aun las Bulas Apostolicas huvieran dicho, que solo les daban la Proteccion: essa en los Reyes significa, è incluye Jurisdiccion.\" Protection, on this reading, is not an alternative to dominion but a form of it.", "sources": [ "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-retencion-y-abandono" ], "confidence": 0.9 }, { "id": "c10", "text": "§28, page 47, grounds the whole in Spanish confessional purity, and the claim is kept here because it is the chapter's own and a defensive entry would drop it: the charge could not have been given elsewhere \"por estár ellos, y sus vassallos por la misericordia Divina tan firmes, puros, y limpios en la Fé Catholica, y obediencia de la Santa Iglesia Romana, y sin mezcla de heregia, con la qual se hallaban tan manchadas otras Naciones, que no se les pudiera cometer segura, ni prudentemente conquista tan espiritual, y sagrada sin peligro, de que sembráran errores, y abrojos … como lo confiessan, y reconocen, no solo nuestros Autores; sino aun los estraños.\"", "sources": [ "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-retencion-y-abandono" ], "confidence": 0.9 }, { "id": "c11", "text": "What this entry establishes and what it does not. It establishes that the standard treatise on the law of the Indies, in nine paragraphs of its first book, argued the Spanish position from the law of possession rather than from the justice of the conquest; that it held abandonment of the Indies to be a sin and cited Las Casas, Vitoria, Soto and Córdoba for that holding; that it invoked the doctrine that restitution of an unjustly occupied kingdom ceases once populations are mixed, with Navarre as the general example and the Bishop of Chiapa named for the Indies; that it imputed envy to those who continued the dispute; and that it read a grant of mere protection as including jurisdiction. It does not establish that Las Casas, Vitoria, Soto, Córdoba, Acosta, Matienzo, Botero, Rebello, Freitas, Pierre Matthieu, Hurtado de Mendoza or Diana wrote what is attributed to them: not one of those works was opened, and every attribution here is the treatise's own footnote. It is scoped to §§20-28; §§1-19 and §§29-37 are carried by other entries of this corpus, and §§38-41 by feudo-de-la-iglesia-y-la-licencia-de-los-reyes.", "sources": [ "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-retencion-y-abandono" ], "confidence": 0.9 } ], "takeaways": [], "faqs": [], "evidence_tier": "primary", "evidence": { "level": "industry_observation", "source_types": [ "paper" ] }, "moat_flag": false, "winning_edge": "Accounts of the Spanish debate over the Indies that this entry's search reached end where the famous quarrel ends — with Vitoria, Las Casas and Sepúlveda, and with the question whether the conquest was just. They do not follow the argument into the form it actually took once the empire was old, which is the form that governed: not whether taking the Indies had been lawful, but whether giving them back could now be required. This entry gives that argument in the printed words of the treatise the Council of the Indies worked from — the shift to possession at §20, probabilism as the standard of retention at §21, abandonment as a sin at §22, and the doctrine at §23 that restitution ceases once populations are mixed. It also puts on the record the thing a summary loses and a defensive account would suppress: the authorities the crown's jurist cites for the duty to stay are, by his own footnotes, the guardianship authorities — Las Casas twice, Vitoria, Soto, Córdoba — and the entry says in terms that whether they held what is attributed to them is unverified here, because the attribution is an opponent's footnote and nothing more.", "confidence": 0.85, "last_verified": "2026-09-29", "media": [], "x": {}, "canonical_url": "https://hispanic-legacy.com/k/retencion-de-las-indias-y-el-pecado-de-abandonarlas", "api_url": "https://hispanic-legacy.com/api/k/retencion-de-las-indias-y-el-pecado-de-abandonarlas.json", "jsonld": { "@context": "https://schema.org", "name": "Retention, not conquest: the argument that Spain could not lawfully give the Indies back, and the authorities cited for it", "description": "Política Indiana libro I capítulo XI §§20-28 moves the question from acquiring the Indies to keeping them, where the law favours possession and a probable opinion suffices. §22 holds that the kings could not abandon them \"sin pecado\" — the converted would apostatise — and §23 that restitution ceases once populations are mixed, citing Navarre and, at footnote (39), the Bishop of Chiapa. §24 calls the remaining debate envy of the Spanish nation.", "url": "https://hispanic-legacy.com/k/retencion-de-las-indias-y-el-pecado-de-abandonarlas", "license": "https://spdx.org/licenses/CC-BY-4.0.html", "dateModified": "2026-09-29", "citation": [ { "@type": "CreativeWork", "name": "Política Indiana, libro I, capítulo XI, §§20-28 — that retaining the Indies is an easier case than acquiring them, and that abandoning them would be a sin: at §20 that the argument 'procede mucho mas llanamente, quando se trata, no yá de adquirir, sino de retener lo adquirido, en que siempre todas las leyes admiten mayor latitud; y en causas, que aun en sí puedan recibir dudas, y variedad de opiniones, quieren que se siga, la que favorece à la possession'; at §21 that 'el estatuto, que prohibe el adquirir alguna cosa, si particularmente no expressa lo contrario, no es visto prohibir la retencion de ella' and that to retain and not sin in not relinquishing 'basta que estrive en opinion probable'; at §22 that all agree that even if the kings 'quisieran voluntariamente dexar las Indias, y abdicar de sí el derecho, ò dominio, que tienen, y exercen en ellas, no lo pudieran hacer sin pecado', the footnote (36) reading 'Chiap. advers. Sepulved. fol. 54. & in tract. Comprobat. fol. 2. Victor. de Ind. Insulan. relect. 2. n. 13. & 14. Soto, Greg. Lopez, Cordub. omninò videndus', the reasons being that it would be 'faltar à lo prometido à la Iglesia, al amparo de los Indios, yá convertidos, que sin su cuidado apostatarian, y bolverian à su Idolatría, y perversas costumbres', and that the pope could then assign another Christian prince, 'segun la opinion del glorioso Santo Thomás, seguida comunmente por Theologos, y Canonistas'; at §23 that another opinion 'no menos comun, y segura' teaches 'que aun en los Reynos injustamente ocupados, cessa la obligacion de restituirlos, quando yá están mezclados con otros, que legitimamente posseen', with 'el Reyno de Navarra' as the general example, and 'en terminos terminantes de nuestras Indias, el Obispo de Chiapa, con ser, el que mas escrupulos ha movido cerca de ellas, y otros, que le siguen', the footnote (39) reading 'Chiap. d. tract. Comprob. fol. 30. Victor. vbi sup. Acost. Matienz. Boter. Rebello, Freitas'; at §24 that 'oy son inutiles, y escusadas las questiones, que mas por curiosidad, ò embidia de nuestra Nacion, que por otro fin mueven en esta materia algunos Hereges', Pedro Matheo, Hurtado de Mendoza and Diana giving 'expressamente dán nombre de embidia à semejantes disputas'; at §25 that the kings may 'no solo … retener las Indias; sino hacer guerra abierta à los Indios, que se les revelassen en ellas, ò à otros, que se las invadiessen, ò perturbassen', as 'Juan Botero, con ser Autor estraño, en sus Relaciones Universales' concedes; at §26 that the dominion had to be 'tan amplo, y absoluto' because so grave a matter 'requeria, que le tuviesse tal sobre ellos algun Principe Christiano'; at §27 that even had the bulls said they gave only Protection, 'essa en los Reyes significa, è incluye Jurisdiccion'; and at §28 that the charge could not safely have been given to nations 'tan manchadas' with heresy, the Spaniards being 'tan firmes, puros, y limpios en la Fé Catholica'", "url": "https://books.google.com/books?id=huEykw_YtzYC&pg=PA46" } ], "@type": "Article", "headline": "Retention, not conquest: the argument that Spain could not lawfully give the Indies back, and the authorities cited for it" } }