Successes+Failures


 * __Successes__**

They also carried out an inquiry into the Indian question at which all the encomenderos asserted that the Indians were quite incapable of living freely without their supervision. Las Casas was disappointed and infuriated. When he accused the Hieronymites of being complicit in kidnapping Indians, the relationship between Las Casas and the commissioners broke down. Las Casas had become a hated figure by Spaniards all over the Islands and he had to seek refuge in the Dominican monastery. The Dominicans had been the first to indict the encomenderos and they continued to chastise them and refuse the absolution of confession to slave owners, and even stated that priests who took their confession were committing a mortal sin. In May 1517, Las Casas was forced to travel back to Spain to denounce to the regent the failure of the Hieronymite reforms. Only after Las Casas had left did the Hieronymites begin to congregate Indians into towns similar to what Las Casas had wanted.


 * __Failures__**

In this early work, Las Casas advocated importing Black slaves from Africa to relieve the suffering Indians, a stance he later retracted, becoming an advocate for the Africans in the colonies as well. [|[27]][|[28]][|[29]][|[b]] This shows that Las Casas's first concern was not to end slavery as an institution, but to end the physical abuse and suffering of the Indians. [|[30]] In keeping with the legal and moral doctrine of the time Las Casas believed that slavery could be justified if it was the result of [|Just War], and at the time he assumed that the enslavement of Africans was justified. [|[31]] Worried by the visions that Las Casas had drawn up of the situation in the Indies, Cardenal Cisneros decided to send a group of [|Hieronymite] friars to take over the government of the islands.

Las Casas and King Charles V: The peasant colonization scheme
When he arrived in Spain, his former protector, regent and [|Cardinal Ximenez Cisneros] was ill, and had become tired of Las Casas's tenacity. Las Casas resolved to meet instead with the young King Carlos I. Ximenez died on November 8, and the young King arrived in Valladolid on November 25 of 1517. Las Casas managed to secure the support of the King's Flemish courtiers including the powerful Chancellor Jean de la Sauvage. Las Casas's influence turned the favor of the court against Secretary Conchillos and Bishop Fonseca. Sauvage spoke highly of Las Casas to the King, who appointed Las Casas and Sauvage to write a new plan for reforming the governmental system of the Indies. [|[34]]

Las Casas suggested a plan where the encomienda would be abolished and Indians would be congregated into self-governing townships to become tribute-paying vassals of the King. He still suggested that the loss of Indian labor for the colonists could be replaced by allowing [|importation of African slaves]. Another important part of the plan was to introduce a new kind of sustainable colonization, and Las Casas advocated supporting the migration of Spanish peasants to the Indies where they would introduce small scale farming and agriculture, a kind of colonization that didn't rely on resource depletion and Indian labor. Las Casas worked to recruit a large number of peasants who would want to travel to the Islands where they would be given lands to farm and cash advances and the tools and resources they needed to establish themselves there. The recruitment drive was difficult and during the process the power relation shifted at court when Chancellor Sauvage, Las Casas' main supporter, unexpectedly died. In the end a much smaller number of peasant families were sent than originally planned, and they were supplied with insufficient provisions and no support secured for their arrival. Those who survived the journey were ill-received, and had to work hard even to survive in the hostile colonies. Las Casas was devastated by the tragic result of his peasant migration scheme, which he felt had been thwarted by his enemies. He decided instead to undertake a personal venture which would not rely on the support of others, and fought to win a land grant on the American mainland which was in its earliest stage of colonization. [|[35]]