Real Patronato de las Indias

The crown's patronage over the Church in Spanish America: the inalienable right to present every bishop and parish priest, to license every church, monastery and hospital, and to govern the American Church in place of Rome. Codified in Recopilación libro I, título 6, it is the instrument that built and paid for the missions, hospitals and universities — and, in the same clauses, the regalist control that tied clerical advancement to the "extirpación de idolatrías" of the Indians.