Giovanni Cortez

Prof. David Plotke

American Political Though: Race & Citizenship

February 24, 2017

Response to Reading: Bartolomé De La Casas

To quickly summarize Bartolomé De La Casas, he was a 16th century Dominican

Friar from Spain. His childhood and early years aren’t recounted in his piece A Short

Account of The Destruction of The Indies, but seems strategically done perhaps to imply

that the summation of his life’s work led him to write the piece and ultimately become

the “Protector of the Indians”. A Short Account is a true criticism and a fierce

disparagement of Spanish colonialism in the New World. De La Casas reached the

Americas by traveling along one of Columbus’ voyage. There, he witnessed the horrors

of Spain’s New World expeditions, and essentially massacre. He wrote the piece in 1542

in plea to Phillip II for the basic rights of Native peoples, i.e. suggesting that they were

actual people. He makes clear how Columbus’ vision of converting and/or civilizing the

Natives had turned simply into a genocide, which provided enough reason to dedicate his

life to protecting the Native community, a noble cause without any doubt. My reaction of

the text is initially of just that, the form in which it was written, while my reservations

and analysis of De La Casas himself is less related to his character, and more so to our

perception or disposition on him. These ideas, while pretty abstract and thus not truly

rooted in any objective truths, I think are worthwhile and wholly underexplored.
 It’s hard to articulate my reaction to the book without talking about humor. I think

at the core, the sensation I was actually feeling was probably something closer to

discomfort or humiliation, but I also can’t ascribe those feelings to anything else other

than the role comedy played with my reading of the text. At its most basic level, De La

Casas heavily employs repetition in relaying his experiences. Every island in the New

World is subjected to the same horrors. Some more descriptive than others, but you’re

essentially reading the same story over 20 times. A lot of the same words are used from

island to island to the point where reading it in one sitting feels insane, the way insanity

implies humor. The thing about texts of antiquity like these, especially those written to

government in effort to be persuasive, we talk about how every single world has a

meaning and a larger purpose. Nothing is wasted so I wonder if this was intentional on

De La Casas’ part. Of course this reaction has a lot to do with my own personal

constitutions and temperament, though I’m hesitant to take it for granted. When I think

about the expedition of conquistadors and their interactions with Native peoples, I’m

unsure of whether or not I’ve ever formed an expansive enough mental depiction, to

imagine what that looked like, the evils and the severities. De La Casa read like a social

thriller, the genre of horror where the scariest monster is ironically the human capability.

The horror is embedded in the ludicrousness and hilarity of the ways in which we think

and interact; imaging De La Casas as a 15th century The Shining (I can’t imagine I’m the

only person who saw the comedy in that film). A Short Account evoked full absurdity, a

horrid fun-house amusement park like setting where the smiles of murderous Spaniards

stretched ear to ear while the blood of Native people’s squirted like lemons. Something

about that image seems more convincing to me than a more tamed version.
 To reiterate my view on De La Casas, I must maintain that the criticism is less

about the man himself and perhaps more about how he is viewed, what ‘credit’ he is

given. I think often he is presented in opposition to Columbus, something like an anti-

Columbus or that of an “alternative hero”, a completely rigid take on a complicated

figure entrenched in an even more complicated and flawed value system. It’s impossible

to assess the complete nature or intention of a person from history and doing so from the

perspective of a contemporary value system is a fallacy as well. If that were the case,

there are few people worth celebrating at all before the 17th century, but my point is to

say that while De La Casas certainly showed a higher sense of conscience and conviction,

he also suggested the use of Africans as slaves in place of the Natives rather than working

for the end of slavery altogether. He reasoned that the relocation would be less severe

being so far removed and they could survive better. My understanding is that he made the

claim in 1516 and two years later Jamaica imported it’s first slaves from Africa. While he

later rescinded that idea, stating his regret in History of the Indies and saying that all

forms of slavery are unjust, he also stipulated that the text not be released for four

decades after it’s completion. One would assume that making such a wrong claim that

had immense influence on the world, he would want to do more against it as he did for

the Natives, but nothing else in his life points to such truth. I don’t have the historical

knowledge to fully proclaim something like De La Casas’ as the father of African slave

trade in the Indies, but I think to some degree it holds weight so viewing him as some sort

of positive alternative to Columbus is shortcoming and inadequate at best. I question

where that gesture comes from; what is it with the Western world’s need to celebrate

white men? This includes institutionally because I recall learning about De La Casas in
high school. No one can doubt he did a lot of great things for Natives, but by that point it

goes to show how most people don’t think about Africa much.