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The coloured population had very little to gain from the wars of independence - Discuss.

The reading of discourses from the period immediately preceding the Independence of Spanish America presents the reader with the image of a unified nation fighting for justice and equality. Writers such as Simon Bolívar reveal the sense of resentment felt towards Spanish colonial rule in the Americas and the desire for independence. In La Carta de Jamaica, he states that “la posición de los moradores del hemisferio Americano ha sido, por siglos, puramente pasiva: su existencia política era nula. Nosotros estábamos en un grado todavía más bajo de la servidumbre”. (Bolívar: 1979, pg. 62) He complains about the “restriciones chocantes” on trade implemented by Spanish rule, which force Americans into the role “de simples consumidores”. (Bolívar: 1979, pg. 63)

Reading La Carta de Jamaica, it is easy to imagine a world characterised by racial harmony. Although Bolívar was a Creole of pure Spanish descent, in the letter a feeling of solidarity is expressed towards Spanish America’s coloured population. He claims that “no somos ni indios ni europeos, sino una especie media entre los legítimos propietarios del país y los usurpadores españoles”. (Bolívar: 1979, pg. 62) It is as though the “we” refers to the Mestizo population; (being those who were of mixed Indian and white European race) even though Bolívar was a representative of the Creoles. In truth, he was the direct descendents of “los usurpadores españoles” however the letter aims to form a sense of unity between the Mestizo and Creole population, whilst at the same time, distancing the Creoles from their Spanish heritage.

When Bolívar makes reference to the Indian in his carta, it is a reference to the Indian of the past, and the allusions are used to question the legitimacy of Spain’s rule by bringing up the injustices inflicted upon native populations during the conquest. He mentions “las barbaridades que los Españoles cometieron” which “la presente edad ha rechazado como fabulosas, porque parecen superiores a la perversidad humana” (Bolívar: 1979, pg. 56) and then goes on to describe the people of Latin America as “muy oprimidos”. In this way, he places himself in the same category as the original inhabitants of the Americas and suggests that the whole of Spanish America’s contemporary population had suffered equal injustice at the hands of the Spanish.

It is clear from this that Bolívar understood the importance of having the majority of the Latin American population on side when it came to the fight for independence. Mestizos formed over a half of the entire population, and so he took this into account when writing his discourse. He also describes the Indians as “los legítimos propietarios” of the Americas which was an attempt to gain support from this section of the population. La Carta de Jamaica is, in fact, an account of Creole discontentment at the time, and was written due to a feeling of discontent among Creoles that the presence of colonial rule did not enable them to assume certain positions of authority that could only be occupied by Spaniards.

However the letter it is written as though it were representative of Latin America’s entire population in an attempt to create a sense of harmony. After all, “what did an African slave, a Quechua-speaking villager, a landowner of pure Spanish blood, and a mestizo artisan have in common just because they had all been born” (Chasteen: 2001, pg. 92) in the same country? The answer is “not much, obviously, aside from being subjects of the Spanish Crown”. Therefore Creoles such as Bolívar had to work hard in order to create that vision of a unified nation which was, unfortunately, false and was simply a device put in place by Creoles to achieve their own interests. In reality, Latin America’s coloured population “had little at stake in the Creole-versus-Peninsular contest, because the caste system put them out of the competition”. (Chasteen: 2001, pg. 97)

This caste system originated from the very beginning of contact between Spanish colonisers and the native population that they encountered in the Americas. From the moment of their arrival, the Spanish assumed the role of rulers over the native population. It was ordered of all Indigenous people that they “vengan a la fe y dar la obediencia a los reyes de Castilla, si no, que les harán guerra a la fuego y a sangre y los matarán y captivarán”. (Las Casas: Pg. 32) However these people had no previous knowledge or understanding of either Christianity or the King of Castile. The presumption by the Spanish Crown that it had the right to supreme power must be questioned; “with what right did the Papacy grant possession to the Kings of Castile over countries already inhabited and governed by their own rulers? Were the natives of the New World so deficient in common humanity as to justify armed conquest?” (Brading: 1936, pg. 79) However not only did the Europeans strip away the right of the natives to rule over their own people, but they also treated them in a fashion that can only described as atrocious and inhumane.

The colonisation process may have ended, long before the push towards America’s independence, however it is this event that set the tone for the continuation of an unbalanced relationship between those people of European descent and the coloured population of Latin America. “In so far as there was a nation it was a Creole nation, for the castes had only an obscure sense of national identity and the Indians and Negroes none at all”. (Lynch: 1927) Following colonisation, the introduction of an African population, first brought over to the Americas as slave labour, brought with it increasing racial variation. The creation of new races produced by the mixing of the original three races present in the Americas led to the new categories of mestizo, mulatto and sambo. These races along with the original native people made up Spanish America’s non-white or coloured population, and also formed the vast majority of its entire people.

Thus we are presented with a paradox; the cultural heritage and political rule of an entire nation was defined by a small minority, being the Creole minority of European descent. This hegemony meant that the majority of Spanish America’s people possessed neither political nor economic power, and was forced to submit to a structure of power in which the elite ruling class were always white Europeans, and a person of any other race was thus considered as “lower class”. It is in this way that the hierarchy of Latin American society was determined; by race. The Creoles attempt to build up an idea of a collective identity between the races was short lived and was only ever intended to last until they had used the coloured population to achieve their goal of independence.

Following independence, the caste system of determining races was officially abolished, and “in republics, all but slaves were supposed to be citizens, equal to other citizens”. (Chasteen: 2001, pg. 121) However the hierarchal system originating from colonial rule and placing the white population in power remained firmly in place. Slavery receded in republics but remained in non-republican countries such as Cuba and Puerto Rico. The Indian, previously used by the Creoles as a symbol of national identity, returned to its former position of being labelled as “inferior”, “brainless” and “incompatible with modernity”. And so while in theory Latin America was a free society, the majority of its people truly gained very little from independence because the white elite refused to acknowledge the rights of non-whites.

Therefore it is clear that the statement « The coloured population had very little to gain from the wars of independence » is entirely justified. Creoles saw independence as an opportunity for their own personal advancement and had no motivation to ameliorate the circumstances of non-whites. In fact, they “feared the social climbing of prosperous people of mixed race and fought to keep them ‘in their place’”. (Chasteen: 2001, pg. 98) So that if anything, it was the Creole population who posed more of a threat to any attempt of the American coloured population to advance themselves.

Independence signified for many non-whites the worsening of their difficulties rather than freedom. The Indian tribute demanded by the Spanish Crown was abolished, but this brought with it the responsibility of the education of the entire native society. Land which was formerly classified as Indian reservations was liberated, split up, and shared out among the Indian population. However they had no source of capital to invest into cultivation and so were forced to turn to rich landowners for loans. These loans were given, but at high interest rates, and so as the debts mounted up, most Indians had no choice but to give up their land and become landless peasants.

Therefore the landowners’ wealth increased, while the supposedly liberated Native Americans returned to a way of life that was not far from that of a slave. Exploitative labour systems remained in place and these people had no other option save death from starvation, but to work the land that once belonged to them. They were paid in vouchers that they could only redeem in the shops belonging to the landowner for whom they worked. Thus they were trapped with no means to alleviate their debts or to advance economically, socially or politically. Segregation was encouraged by the elite and in fact, they “considered indigenous people and their lands a national problem”. (Chasteen: 2001, pg. 121) No provision was made for those of African descent as they were liberated from slavery, and they also joined the Indians as landless peasants. Only the Creole elite held the right to vote, and thus the non-white population remained completely excluded from any political opportunity. Although on paper, and as far as the outside world was concerned, Latin America was now a society free of racial discrimination, the reality remained a far cry from this. In conclusion, to state that « The coloured population had very little to gain from the wars of independence » is, unfortunately, much more accurate than many would like to believe or admit.

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