The Canonical Slave Legislation of America in Colonial Peru and Mexico during the XVI and XVII Centuries

Abstract

The Church, in the pursuit of establishing a slave and catholic society, built a legal structure that empowered all the members of the colonial society to own spiritual rights. Thus, baptism, marriage, the last rites, and the rest of the sacraments were inalienable rights for every human being – although being slave –, recognizing their right to free choice of spouse and co-habitation. There was also the establishment of financial penalties and excommunication as punishments for those who interfered in the normal development of the sacramental rights. All that legislation was captured in the Lima Councils, the Mexican Provincial Councils, the Lima Synods, Puerto Rico, Cuba, etc.