Memorial de Remedios para las Indias is published (1 ene 1516 año – 8 jun 1516 año)
Descripción:
Bartolomé publishes his first book titled Memorial de Remedios para las Indias, which chronicles a complete moratorium on the use of Indian labor in the Indies until such time as better regulations of it were set in place. This was meant simply to halt the decimation of the Indian population and to give the surviving Arawak's and Tainos time to reconstitute themselves. Bartolomé feared that at the rate the exploitation was proceeding it would be too late to hinder their annihilation unless action were taken rapidly. The second was a change in the labor policy so that instead of a colonist owning the labor of specific Indians, he would have a right to man-hours, to be carried out by no specific persons.
This required the establishment of self-governing native communities on the land of colonists – who would themselves organize to provide the labor for their patron. The colonist would only have rights to a certain portion of the total labor, so that a part of the Indigenous peoples were always resting and taking care of the sick. He proposed 12 other remedies, all having the specific aim of improving the situation for the Natives and limiting the powers that colonists were able to exercise over them.
The second part of the Memorial described suggestions for the social and political organization of Indian communities relative to colonial ones. Bartolomé advocated the dismantlement of the city of Asunción and the subsequent gathering of Indians into communities of about 1,000 Indians to be situated as satellites of Spanish towns or mining areas. Here, Bartolomé argued, Ameridians could be better governed, better taught and indoctrinated in the Christian faith, and would be easier to protect from abuse than if they were in scattered settlements. Each town would have a royal hospital built with four wings in the shape of a cross, where up to 200 sick Indians could be cared for at a time.
He described in detail social arrangements, distribution of work, how provisions would be divided and even how table manners were to be introduced. Regarding expenses, he argued that "this should not seem expensive or difficult, because after all, everything comes from them [the Indians] and they work for it and it is theirs."He even drew up a budget of each pueblo's expenses to cover wages for administrators, clerics, Bachelors of Latin, doctors, surgeons, pharmacists, advocates, ranchers, miners, muleteers, hospitalers, pig herders, fishermen, etc. He showed that this arrangement could easily be maintained and gold still be extracted at a profit.
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Timeline of A Brief Account of the Destruction of the Indies, by Bartolomé de las Casas
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