Clerical Ideology in a Revolutionary Age

Front matter

aja pp

UNIVERSITY OF

CALGARY ki i WA un

Contents

Acknowledgments Introduction

1 A Framework for Studying Clerical Ideology in Guadalajara 2 Imperial Spokesmen for Regional Interests: The Clergy and Government of Guadalajara in the Colonial Period 3 Tensions at the Heart of Clerical Ideology in a Revolutionary Era, 1810—20 4 Towards a Reordered Church: Sermons as Discursive Testimony, 1821-53 5 A Fundamental Shift: Independence, Popular Sovereignty and Freedom of the Press 6 Hegemony Renewed: The Beginnings of a Clerical Counterdiscourse 7 Verbal Virulence and the Struggle for the State 8 The Great Unresolved Issues: The Patronage and Tithes during the Constitutional Regime, 1827-33 9 Clerical Discourse Claims for Itself the Representation of the National Will, 1833-53

Conclusion Notes Bibliography Index vi

Chapter One 20€

The clergy made an appreciable effort to adapt advantageously to the new course of the country. The clerical modus operandi demanded that the individuals with the right to speak about the moment be selected according to the standards of the ecclesiastical body. In Jalisco, except for the period immediately following the death of Bishop Cabañas in late 1824, there is a recognizable shaping of clerical ideology by the bishop and his cathedral chapter (college of canons of the diocese). Even anonymous clerical pamphlets, since they generally did not spark rejection by the church authorities, can be presumed to have been published with their tolerance or tacit support. While their positions certainly varied, they were clearly instruments in the Church’s search for a sure path as an institution. Once an officially proclaimed position had been set, all other parts of the Church owed obedience. In the meantime, the coexistence of different and heterogeneous elements within the ecclesiastical body was assured, although there was an attempt to keep certain common assumptions about doctrinal orthodoxy, the vital role of the clergy in national life, and the organic integration of the whole of society. That is why the pamphlets can be read as an expression of the tensions between inherited ideology and the demands of the moment. We can measure the efforts of the Church to position itself vis-à-vis the dominant social groups of the period by examining the discourse Church spokesmen, official or self-proclaimed, produced at different political moments to achieve that clear objective, and even by examining the inconsistencies, contradictions, and variability of that discourse. This suggests that the official positions of the Church itself were to a significant degree reached by debate between the potentially different opinions of the various clerical leaders.?!

In summary, during this period clerical ideology proved itself as shifting in its expression and formulation as liberal ideology. Therefore the reconstitution or transformation of clerical ideology is best viewed in terms of ideological hegemony. The parameters of social domination changed constantly and profoundly throughout the period under study. The union of government power with the Church was constitutional until 1856, but even so, as an ideological foundation of the state, it suffered significant blows. Society allowed for more people to express their views, since liberalism exalted individual rights.That in itself reflected a change in the status quo. Independence gave voice to an increasingly more plural society, where social actors became the representatives and agents of change by appealing to the central and unquestionable principle of the basic freedom of man.

Independence was connected to a new concept of sovereignty. Now sovereignty should be a product of freedom directly exercised by the people, which, as already suggested, implied turning the traditional pyramid of power upside down. In fact, the nearly unrestricted freedom of the press would exert pressure on the structures of political power. There was an aspiration to shaping the country so as to include a collection of groups with equal rights in social and political life. But, meanwhile, in the midst of the change towards popular sovereignty, the interests of the bureaucracy and the Church continued to exercise a power which is still not adequately understood. To put it differently, the state bureaucracy and the Church bureaucracy would have to redefine themselves with regard to popular sovereignty, even while still entertaining doubts about it. In turn, sovereignty was vulnerable on questions of internal order and foreign threats. The following chapters will explore some aspects of this dynamic, placing special emphasis on the central role of the Church in Guadalajara.

l

The Clergy and Government of Guadalajara in the Colonial Period

Imperial Plans and Regional Energies ver the course of the eighteenth century, New Spain O experienced the growing regionalization of “economic

spaces” in the hands of local elites. Alejandra Moreno Toscano and Enrique Florescano have described the regional consolidation of Guadalajara within this larger setting. Regional competitors grew stronger in the face of Mexico City, which attempted with mixed success to rule over the whole territorial economic space of New Spain. Guadalajara exercised progressively larger influence over an important portion of western Mexico. As the seat of an audiencia and an extensive diocese, Guadalajara was already a legal and administrative center, and now it expanded its economic and cultural role.'

New dynamics in Spain favored the strengthening of Mexico's regions. In fact, the goal was to break them away from their old colonial center, Mexico City. In general terms, the objective was to produce a commercial renewal of Spain based on the promotion of Spanish agriculture and industry. Manufactures in particular were to be destined for the American market, which itself would grow due to the greater prosperity produced by the development of regional resources. To this end, the idea was to encourage in the Americas the mining of precious minerals and large-scale agriculture for domestic and export markets. Even

Af subsistence agriculture was to expand, through the redistribution of excess lands to indigenous communities and higher-ranking casta groups. The desire to effectively carry out this great transformation led Spanish authorities to consider how regional government in America could be made more effective. As a result, the interests of the affected regions would have to be promoted.”

The new drive was set within a larger, clearly military effort at imperial defense. Since the 1760s, there had been interest in fortifying regional interests in northern New Spain. This meant defending them from foreign attacks by building a stronger socio-economic basis for military power. This turned out to be a difficult task. But it involved the Guadalajara region from the beginning, with the outfitting of the port of San Blas for supplying the population of California and Sonora. Shortly afterwards, artisan industry began to grow. The causes were the war in the Atlantic and its interruption of overseas commercial flows, along with the growing regional population. Both commerce within the region and exports outside the region expanded. The traditional linking of regional growth to the livestock market of the center of the country — and to the power of Mexico City — weakened. The agricultural market of Guadalajara grew stronger along with the population increase, and local manufactures expanded dynamically?

The policies of Charles III produced hopes that this expansion, in good measure spontaneous and without state direction, might continue. The death of the monarch in 1788 led to a certain ideological reading of the situation on the part of the Guadalajara elite, encouraged by new Intendant Jacobo Ugarte y Loyola and members of the traditional high clergy. To understand this, we should stress that, by this time, New Spain had been administratively reorganized, with the creation of the system of intendancies and a centralized military command on the northern frontier [comandania general de las provincias internas].*

The new situation also brought territorial adjustments to Guadalajara. The intendant of Guadalajara assumed clear military functions and proceeded to organize militias at strategic points across his territory. The new intendancy of Guadalajara gave clearer administrative definition to the territory under the economic sway of the city market. Nonetheless, the financial interests of the capital reached beyond these new limits. The founding of a merchant guild in 1795, six years after the effective organization of the intendancy, officially reasserted the supraregional role of Guadalajara by establishing its control over the entire territory of New Galicia. Similarly, the Royal and Literary University of Guadalajara, created in 1792, exercised effective power over the enormous hinterland of New Galicia, and not merely over the immediately neighboring territory of the intendancy. The audiencia consolidated its broad jurisdiction, and the creation of the mint in 1812 should be seen as an additional sign that the scope of Guadalajara influence was more New Galicia than Jalisco proper.”

There was already talk of a new viceroyalty in the north of New Spain, and Guadalajara figured among the proposed capitals. The region was on the road to consolidation, but its exact future course was not yet clear. Invoking the legal framework of a viceroyalty for social life meant looking to the past, since this was a Hapsburg administrative form, not a Bourbon one. But this call was sparked by what was in many respects a radically new situation for New Galicia. In addition, the creation of a viceroyalty need not eliminate the system of intendancies as a mode of political organization subordinated to the new Viceroy. It could well be an instrument to make the future government of the new entity more viable. If so, the new regional force of Guadalajara would draw most of northern Mexico towards it, creating a parallel with the traditional reach of the viceroyalty of New Spain.‘

The Elaboration of a Regionalist Ideological Discourse

No single movement proposed a political platform and socioeconomic project for the future of Guadalajara, its immediate surroundings and larger hinterland. The elements that, bit by bit, would make up the vision of local interests and their project for the future became clearer over the course of the period under study. Before 1821, the clergy played a noteworthy role in the ideological formulation of this growing regionalism. The clergy had a forum for their ideas in the pulpit and the printing press and were subject to almost obligatory consultation in forging new directions for the political and socioeconomic development of the area.’

There was not yet any insuperable opposition between the clergy and the state, much less between the clergy and society. The ecclesiastical corporation, an entity inherited from the Hapsburg era, attempted to adjust itself to demands for change and saw an effective means of contributing to that change in the new n

Chapter Two YK

Bourbon approach to reform and transformation. For the regionalism that was taking shape, Bourbon efforts to shake up the Hapsburg regime seemed to augur a brighter future. It was not immediately evident that the prosperity foreseen would put the ecclesiastical corporation in check. Enlightened absolutism promised to carry out the necessary change without meddling in thorny questions of political power. Growth promised greater incomes — not only for individuals and the state, but also for the Church itself. With greater rents, the corporation could set its course for the future, increasing its presence in education and other activities of public benefit, as well as broadening its missionary efforts in the far north. Trimming away what was worthless about local tradition, and speeding up the flowering of what was best about it, seemed to constitute a clear mandate in Guadalajara. Here, love of the land was linked to support for its growth and regional consolidation. Reformulations did not seem to imply annihilating the old regime, but rather gradually improving it. Since there was no clear boundary between promoting local interests and new Bourbon measures, tradition was not opposed to modern ideas about the state, or to the architects of its transformation.

Thus, it is not surprising that leading figures of the Guadalajara priesthood fervently lined up behind eighteenth-century reformist policies. While these policies reached their peak during the reign of Charles HI, they only produced powerful effects in the intendancy during the reign of his successor. After the change of the guard, examples of this kind of ecclesiastical thinking abound. In 1789, Doctor Gaspar Gonzalez de Candamo, canon of the cathedral, saw an opportunity to preach on the Bourbon reforms in his sermon honoring the recently deceased Charles HI. He took advantage of the moment to favorably sum up the policies of Charles III and suggest that similar reforms be applied to New Galicia. The printing of the sermon, which ran to forty-six pages and a one-page errata, preserved for posterity the force of hopes for change and for political, intellectual and economic progress awakened by the government whose future was now uncertain due to the change of the throne. In the first six pages of his sermon, Gonzalez de Candamo found a way to remind his parishioners that they had received great benefits from the monarch, who had concerned himself with the well-being of his vassals and had always been guided by the recognition that “the love and trust of subjects are the only solid foundation for the duration and prosperity of empires.”

In his speech, which was called a sermon although it did not touch deeply on any religious theme, the vigorous priest made clear that Charles III always strove for peace in order to “attend in its midst to the sole, solid, and true prosperity of his dominions, which he saw as his first obligation" This was necessary in order to straighten the erroneous ways of Spain over the past two centuries, since the death of Charles V. Because it had erred so tremendously in its government policies, this country

... Which from the times of that Charles, who made himself obeyed and respected by the entire world, to those of his great-great-greatgrandson Charles II, had fallen from the summit of power and opulence to the depths of weakness and misery, had fought in continuous and extremely costly wars in the days of Philip V, and had barely begun in the brief years of Ferdinand VI to lay down the foundations of its true happiness, when Charles III took in his hands the reigns of government.’

Canon González de Cándamo was now coming to his point. He immediately painted a portrait of a desolate Spain whose decline Charles III had come to conjure away:

Agriculture decayed, the countryside half-depopulated, industry fully lost, commerce in the hands of foreigners, the arts of all kinds ignored, and the sciences treated mostly in uncultured style, and nearly reduced to stubborn and useless disputes: witness the state of the Crown of Spain when it was placed on the head of Charles III."

What was behind the agricultural misery of Spain? González de Cándamo pointed to the price control on grains and the defense of extensive grazing lands for the ranchers of the Mesta. These made agriculture expensive and stagnant. He declared that it was the wisdom of the statesman king which had overcome these difficulties, and along with them, those which had blocked the profitable exporting of grains. Old canals were widened and new ones were opened. At the same time, the difficult colonization of the Sierra Morena was carried out, leaving the area in the hands of “the simple worker, the industrious artisan, the man of honor and integrity, agreeable to the eyes of God and useful to the King and the Fatherland.”*

Charles III brought industry and commerce, those “two foundations of true riches," back to life in Spain. With this, he proved al

Chanter Two 20€ that Spanish character was not made up of “laziness, idleness and slackness.” The “danger of the utter ruin of the Fatherland” and the dependence of Spanish consumption on imports were conjured away by the new monarch along with the mistaken system of government which Spain had followed for more than two centuries. Appropriate care was give to "the mechanical arts,” and this encouragement revived them. Textile factories managed to recover the markets of the peninsula and the Americas, and “all branches of industry grew greatly in [just a] few years. The means of subsistence increased, and with that, the population, which is the principal foundation on which the prosperity or misfortune of states is built"? The canon declared:

Neither can commerce flourish without agriculture and industry providing material for its flows, nor can agriculture and industry endure, if they are not animated and enlivened by commerce, which for that reason is rightly called the soul of the republic and the life of states.

To promote commercial interchange, Charles had opened new roads, pursued bandits, managed "to reduce and correct the coin to a single minting,” increasing the circulation of money with the founding of the National Bank of San Carlos, upheld the value of royal debts, facilitated and cheapened mercantile exchange, and impeded the clandestine flight of precious metals. He pushed for the improvement of old guilds and founded new ones in many places, while more effectively uniting Spain and the Americas by establishing maritime mail service. Even more importantly for the Americas, González de Cándamo argued, Charles had broken Cadiz’ monopoly over commerce with the dominions of the New World, a measure accompanied by the suppression of some taxes and the reduction of others. There was a strong push for overseas navigation: more goods were carried and the cost of sending them dropped. “The Royal Tribunal of Mining was created in these domains, and the price of mercury had previously been lowered, all towards the goal that a greater abundance of fruits and metals give a rapid push to commerce to the common utility of Spain and the Americas.”** In addition, a greater human freedom was added to the free flow of goods:

Shortly afterwards, he removed from the necks of the unhappy inhabitants of the New World the heavy yoke under which they had

Imperia! Spokesmen for Regional Interests groaned in exhaustion, the barbarous and tyrannical custom which — in opposition to the liberty nature itself gives — had demanded of the miserable Indian that he sell the sweat of his brow to those who held the authority to value it as they pleased.”

Looking on the reaction that Charles III's reforms had drawn from monopoly interests and their allies as “worry and ignorance," the cathedral Canon comforted himself and assured his parishioners that "justice will prevail over cunning, and the son of Charles III will confirm and even extend the providences of his August Father" Undaunted, he turned immediately to the accomplishments of the King in avoiding war in Africa and Europe which, along with his creation of the Royal Philippines Company, had advanced commerce on all three continents. He quickly reviewed the King's promotion of the fine arts, including the creation of the San Carlos Academy in New Spain, from where “lights will reach these far-off provinces." As for the sciences, he asserted:

Charles opened the doors which worry and ignorance dressed up in the cape of religion had kept under double lock. Light came in, and shadows melted away immediately. The universities were reformed. Those endless disputes which had been virtually our only occupation, in which entire centuries had been wasted without advancing a single step, began to be looked upon with disdain, and the straight path that leads to truth was taken."

Modern philosophy was cultivated. Theology was renewed by direct consultation with primary sources. The study of canon law was based on the history and "discipline of the Church." Public and national law replaced the preoccupation with Roman tradition. Oriental languages were positively valued, and natural history, chemistry, minerology and metallurgy were introduced, "sciences which were more important than any others, not to say indispensable, for the prosperity of the state." Similarly, botanists and naturalists were sent to the Americas to learn of “its mostly unknown wonders.”**

As González de Cándamo drew nearer to American shores, near the middle of his speech, he apologized to his parishioners for going on at such length. Then the fearless Canon continued with his summary of what was most important about the regime of the deceased King. He celebrated the attack on vagrants,

Chapter Two XX beggars and the idle, the good government and cleanliness of cities, and the increase and enlightenment of the army and navy which had been achieved "without damaging agriculture or industry.” Among the new administrative arrangements, the King had "increased the number and staff of all the ministries of every judicial court in the Americas" But more than all these wise and prudent measures — and many more similar ones — Charles had known how to fulfill the role of a monarch. He had shown this by declaring that “all the earthly tragedies that could befall me would affect my heart less than the unhappiness of my subjects whom God has entrusted to me.” The Canons voice boomed: "O words worthy of being etched in marble for the instruction of sovereigns! Come, Kings, understand your obligation, you who rule this earth; learn the charge the crown brings with it"?

Again and again he came back to this same question of the political direction of the reforms, which ultimately was a reflection of the exhaustion of the Hapsburg hierarchy and the new attention to producers and merchants. This new direction promised to bear great fruit. Charles’ convictions had smoothed the response to complaints, reforming abuses and dictating

... such enlightened policies. A new light seemed to illuminate Spain. A new sun seemed to have been born. And since we have made use of this comparison, allow me to make use of one more. Just as in the regions situated on the other side of the Tropics, the rays of the spring sun bring to life a nature half-dead from the rigors of winter, or as in these lands where we live, the summer rains bring lushness and greenness to fields scored by long drought, so the deceased King Charles gave new life and made his dominions flourish again, after they had been reduced to nearly the lowest state of listlessness and misery.”

Before finishing, González de Cándamo would find a way to praise econornic societies, to recall the royal foundation of hospices, hospitals, and colleges of surgeons, to take advantage of the suppression of the branding of slaves to mention again “the laws you are given by nature," to claim once more that the government of Charles had been in keeping with "the sacred right of property, foundation of civil society," to praise the personal virtues of the King, and to demonstrate that the monarch's reforms of clerical abuses were due to his matchless zeal for true religion, including his establishment of the dioceses of Linares and Sonora.”

This very kingdom we dwell in can testify to the large sums spent on its shores, and to the difficult and most costly voyages that were made in order to extend ... [the Catholic faith] to the furthest reaches of new California.”

All that remained for the Canon was the required closing prayer, which he fulfilled with half a page on behalf of “a King at last, who fulfilled exactly the obligations of his crown, searching by all means to exalt his peoples.”

The banner of Enlightenment don Gaspar González de Cándamo raised up in Guadalajara would have a worthy sequel. When Bishop Friar Antonio Alcalde was consulted, on 25 August 1791, about the viability of establishing a merchant guild in Guadalajara, he entrusted the matter to the doctoral canon of the cathedral. He was to write a response representing the opinions of the highest ranks of the Church, including the dean and the cathedral chapter. The terms of the response he produced are interesting. It supported the idea of a guild, not only to resolve disputes between merchants but also to duly help its members to avoid personal bankruptcies and extend commerce. Guadalajara's role was seen not only in terms of its remoteness from Mexico City, but also in terms of the even greater distance from Mexico City of many other towns in New Galicia (that is to say, places within the authority of the audencia, and not only the intendancy, of Guadalajara). On this basis, it explicitly supported the petition for establishing a guild that merchants had made to the intendant of Guadalajara.”

The document stressed the last part of this proposal:

The intendancy of Guadalajara, which other parts are subject to, has twenty-seven subdelegations, twelve mines, and taking into account the jurisdiction of the Royal Audiencia, no fewer than sixty-seven mines. This Diocese includes seventy-four positions for parish priests, seventeen doctrinas [mission parishes] and six encomiendas [Indian jurisdictions under the rule of individual Spaniards or Creoles], totalling ninety-seven.”

The sales taxes from the city of Guadalajara and its dependent areas exceeded 200,000 pesos, considered a substantial sum. The functions of the new guild, the document continued, would encompass the promotion of commerce in New Galicia, which the guild of Mexico was incapable of adequately advancing due to

EN its greater commitment to "the vast territory of the archdiocese of Mexico and the dioceses of Puebla, Valladolid, and Antequera.”

With the guild of Guadalajara established, commerce will flourish in the interior provinces, the population increase recommended by the Sovereign will be achieved, many abandoned mines will be worked, many uncultivated lands will be sown, tithing will multiply, and the worship of the true God and the Catholic religion will be able to spread more easily among the barbarous Indians, all of which would be useful to individuals and to the state, to the Church and to the King, which are the objectives that should be aimed for.”

The ecclesiastical hierarchy proposed that the guild dedicate itself to "promptly providing for the grave urgent public necessities of this city," such as the introduction of water. This would also contribute to improving surrounding agriculture and reducing the harmful dust of the area, which was a health problem. The dust would also be reduced by the swift paving of the streets, which the new guild would undertake. Another problem peculiar to Guadalajara which the guild would fight against was the constant erosion by rain and deepening of ravines “which are nearly at the edges of this city." New roads would be made and the existing ones would be repaired. Meanwhile, under the authority of the guild of Mexico, the indispensable bridges to ease coming and going from Lagos and San Juan had not been built, even though that town celebrated nothing less than the “most famous fair in all of this America.”

The natural industries of the region would be spurred by the establishment of the merchant guild of Guadalajara. According to the cathedral chapter, these industries included silver and gold mining, the production of dyes and paint, “curing of all kinds of leather,” and cotton and wool textiles. The idea of promoting the spread of these enterprises fit into a broader vision of the social question in the area:

As a result of these establishments, Indians of little wisdom will be instilled with taste and civility and will seek employment in work useful to themselves and the state. This will uproot from among the remaining people vagabond begging, the object of indignation, ín order to aid true poverty, the object of charity ... because experience has proven in this city that when there are public works such as the royal palace, the hospital, the cigar factory and other private works employing many workers, if those works cease for lack of materials, then beggars abound and from this comes much vagrancy which, even if it doesn't cause any harm, at least causes alarm. Factories also lead to population, because having something with which to support a family multiplies marriages.”

The document closed with a mention of how the founding of the port of San Blas had spurred agriculture, industry, population and commerce. It also mentioned the increased contribution of Guadalajara merchants to the well-being of the local and viceregal public coffers and to the development of mining, agriculture and other economic transactions “regularly carried out only by merchants, doing without the support of ordinary alcaldes [magistrates], regidores [councilmen] and other officials employed in public works.” Bishop Friar Antonio dispatched it to Intendant Ugarte with a separate note recommending that he trust in the “solid thinking” of the cathedral chapter. The Bishop added that the example of Mexico City should be taken into account, along with “the feelings of enlightened reason and policy, which recommend the distribution of utilities derived from any source among those places and peoples aiding in their collection.” The Bishop explicitly stated that his support for the measure in question — the establishment of the merchant guild — derived from his love for his diocese.??

Not all the manifestations of clerical support for the spirit and practice of Bourbon reforms were made with such zeal for delving into detail. Yet fitting occasions for expressing sentiments like the above were not lacking. One appropriate moment, for example, was on 10 November 1792, at the funeral for Bishop Friar Antonio de Alcalde, who had been in charge of the diocese since 1770 with the exceptional support of Charles III himself, as expressed in a 1788 message. Don Juan Joseph Moreno, the distinguished treasurer of the Guadalajara cathedral, was entrusted with preaching the sermon. In opposition to the defamations of those who had accused the late Bishop of greed and avarice, Moreno turned to detailing his work on behalf of convents, the poor and education in general, whose colleges and schools would show "the Christian and political benefits of such useful establishments." Moreno could not help but mention

[t]hat hospital [San Miguel] as ample and open as his heart, and so many other buildings in which sums have been spent from alms

Chapter Two

XX distributed wisely, since they were directed to uproot idleness and larceny and to promote the arts, so that money might circulate among all the city’s inhabitants by means of the close ties and dependence among them, and in this way the poor would have a means to aid those who were poorer.”

According to Moreno, the Bishop had lived in dignified Christian retreat. But he had not lived in an “Anchorite retreat," since he rightly thought that "the day is for the public, and the night is for me”.* Moreno reproduced Alcalde's own words again in explaining the emphasis placed on detailing the Bishop's charitable gifts — made, we might add, with a certain touch of modern philanthropy. It was necessary, the Bishop had said, "to avoid after my passing the malice which can emerge from one or more men who dislike the light but zealously love the darkness, and take to be true whatever their passion or imagination tells them.”**