More on "The Culmination of the Bourbon Reforms": A Perspective from New Granada

Author(s): Allan J. Kuethe

Reviewed work(s):
Source: The Hispanic American Historical Review, Vol. 58, No. 3 (Aug., 1978), pp. 477-480
Published by: Duke University Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2513964 .
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Hispanic American Historical Review

58(3), 1978, 477-480
Copyright ? 1978 by Duke University Press

More on "The Culmination of the Bourbon Reforms":

A Perspective from New Granada

ALLAN

J.

KUETHE*

The Jacques Barbier-John Fisher exchange in the February 1978

issue of this journal, following upon Barbier's article of February
1977, further elucidates the difficult questions concerning continuity
and discontinuity in colonial policy after the death of Jose de Galvez.
The arguments they advanced and their points of difference, although
pregnant with implications for the whole empire, were focused on
Peru and to a lesser extent, in the case of Barbier, on New Spain.
The experience of New Granada provides additional insights.
Barbier argued that adjustments in colonial policy following the
death of Galvez, although stressing a need to economize and representing a pragmatic retreat from unpopular political and fiscal initiatives, by no means signaled an end to Bourbon determination to
pursue less controversial economic and commercial innovations and
to harness the fruits of those innovations for the benefit of the imperial government. The fate of the Bourbon reforms in New Granada
generally supports Barbier's thesis. The regime of Charles IV, acting
through Antonio Valdes, elected to temper those policies which
antagonized, or threatened to antagonize, the creole patriciate, but it
did not bring the reforms to a halt. Certainly, there was no reluctance
to exploit the opportunities afforded by a growing economy and expanding trade. The agent for policy adjustments was Viceroy Francisco Gil y Lemos, the same figure who, as described by Fisher, later
caused the Peruvian mining reform so much difficulty. A confidant of
Valdes, Gil served for seven months in New Granada during 1789 before
transferring to Peru.'
In New Granada, Gil acted simultaneously to defuse a difficult
political situation and to correct a two-million peso deficit in the
colonial treasury. Because the Comunero Rebellion of 1781 had
* The author is Associate Professor of History at Texas Tech University.
1. Ruben Vargas Ugarte, S.J., Historia del Peru': Virreinato, siglo XVIII
(Buenos Aires, 1957), p. 11.

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ALLAN J. KUETHE

frustrated the reform mission of Regent-Visitor Juan Gutierrez de

Pifieres, the authorities in Santa Fe, headed by Archbishop-Viceroy
Antonio Caballero y Gongora (1782-1789), had been compelled to
move cautiously in effecting political and fiscal reform.2 For military support, the administration had transferred 1,200 veteran troops
from the coast to Santa Fe, had raised a disciplined militia in that district under the command of Spanish officers, and had strengthened
the Popayan militia.3 It had thereby been possible' to advance tax
collection gradually and to expand the unpopular aguardiente and
tobacco monopolies, although not enough to cover expenses.4 Moreover, near the' end of his administration Caballero y Gongora had devised a plan for an intendant system of provincial administrations
The presence of an inland army, however, had further antagonized the
hostile patricians of Santa Fe and Popayan, as manifested by a series
of cabildo protests and bitter civil-military jurisdictional disputes.6
Yet without the armed forces, there seemed little hope of increasing
revenue collections.
Gil prudently elected to ameliorate the financial and political
crisis by stressing the reduction of expenditures rather than attempting to increase taxes and to install stronger administrative machinery
to collect them. He scrapped the projected intendant system and reduced the size of the viceregal secretariat. He urged Valdes to disband the interior militia and to reduce the Santa Fe garrison to six
companies. And he halted work both on building a gunpowder factory and fortifying the capital. True, revenues might decline but, with
a policy of accommodation, so too, it seemed, would the need for an
expensive inland military establishment. Gil also recommended the
abandonment of the costly Indian pacification campaign that his predecessor had waged in Darien with some 1,000 combat troops. Valdes quickly approved these proposals. Meanwhile, stressing strict
mercantilist principles, Gil cancelled dyewood trade concessions
2. John Leddy Phelan, The People and the King: The Comunero Revolution
in Colombia,1781 (Madison, 1978).
3. Allan J. Kuethe, Military Reform and Society in New Granada, 1773-1808
(Gainesville, 1978), pp. 93-94, 104-107, 128.
4. Antonio Caballero y Gongora, "Relacion . . . 1789," in Eduardo Posada

and Pedro Maria Ibainfez,eds., Relaciones de mando: Memorias presentadas por

los gobernantes del Nuevo Reino de Granada (Bogota, 1910), pp. 256-261.
5. Ibid., pp. 256-257;

Informe instructive

de los puntos

. . . para el

establecimiento de las intendencias ... ., 1787, Archivo Nacional de Colombia, Virreyes, vol. 17, fols. 1249-1272.
6. Kuethe, MilitaryReform,pp. 108-114.

FORUM

479

which his predecessor had granted foreign businessmen in return for

flour supplies to feed the forces in Darien.7
Gil's financial strategy was well conceived. Although revenues did
indeed decline in the following years, especially aguardiente receipts,
reduced expenditures more than compensated for the loss. By the turn
of the century, the viceroyalty both paid off its debt and accumulated
1.5 million pesos for Spain.8 Renewed political unrest, however, caused
Gil's successors to lament the weakening of the inland army, but the
authorities in Spain remained faithful to the decisions of 1789.9
The fate of the Granadine mining reform is particularly important
for gauging royal intentions. It will be recalled that the frustration of
a similar program in Peru by Viceroy Gil, coupled with indifference
by the authorities in Spain, led Fisher in his critique of Barbier to
question the depth of the royal commitment to economic reform, particularly if opposed by powerful vested interests. The mining reform
in New Granada dated from 1784 when Galvez sent Juan Jose D'Elhuyar to Mariquita province to modernize silver mining methods.
Eight Saxon technicians joined him in 1788.10 The commission worked
in royally financed mines and never became associated with a separate mining tribunal. Although Gil initially viewed the mining reform
skeptically and momentarily suspended operations, he became its
enthusiastic supporter after personally reviewing the project, applauding both the leadership of D'Elhuyar and the potential of the
Born method of amalgamation. He urged Valdes to reactivate the enterprise, and steady royal support followed." Actually, Gil's optimism
was unfounded. Badly located and hopelessly unproductive, the venture collapsed in 1797. However, as late as 1795, and in the face' of
gloomy reports from Viceroy Jose de Ezpeleta, the mesa for New
Granada in the Ministry of Finance asserted "no hay motivo para arrepe'ntirse de la idea principal que llev6 el Arzobispo-Virrey, y el Sr.
7. Ibid., pp. 146-155; Enrique Sanchez Pedrote, "Gil y Lemos y su memoria
sobre el Nuevo Reino de Granada,"Anuario de Estudios Americanos, 8 (1951),
174, 185-186, 190-191, 202; Jose de Ezpeleta, "Relacion . . . 1796," in Posada
and Ibanfiez,
eds., Relaciones de mando, pp. 279-280.
8. Ezpeleta, in Posada and Iba'n-ez,eds., Relaciones de mando, pp. 379-384;
Pedro Mendinueta,"Relacion... 1803," ibid., pp. 525-531.
9. Ezpeleta to the Conde del Campo Alange, Santa Fe, Sept. 9, 1794, Archivo
General de Simancas, Guerra Moderna, leg. 7063; Mendinueta to Juan Manuel
Alvarez,Santa Fe, June 19, 1798, ibid., leg. 7069.
10. Frank Safford, The Ideal of the Practical: Colombia's Struggle to Form
a Technical Elite (Austin, 1976), p. 92.
11. Gil y Lemos to Valdes, Cartagena, Feb. 28, 1978, and Santa Fe, May
15, 1789, Archivo Generalde Indias, Santa Fe, leg. 838.

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I ALLAN J. KUETHE

Marques de Sonora en estimular a los habitantes de aquel virreinato

a este ramo, por el referido medio extraordinario... ''12
The sharp contrast between official behavior in New Granada and
in Peru is highly suggestive and underscores the importance of Fisher's observations about the failure of the Nordenflicht mission and
about the implications of that failure for Peru. In New Granada, the
mining reform was situated in a backward province, threatened no
important vested interests, and therefore continued to command enthusiastic support. But in Peru, when the broader ambitions of the
mining tribunal encountered stiff opposition from the Lima mercantile oligarchy, the mining reform quickly lost its appeal. Perhaps,
as Barbier argues, the royal administration preferred in such instances
to move indirectly to achieve its objectives; it clearly had no taste for
direct political confrontations. Certainly, the overall validity of Barbier's thesis as tested here for New Granada, including the mining
reform, accents its potential value as a conceptual tool for examining
in other colonies the nature of the Bourbon reforms under Charles IV.
12. Ibid., Expediente D'Elhuyarmining reformcommission.