Empires of the Atlantic World: Britain and Spain in America 1492-1830 (83 page)

The rebellion of the Comuneros, like that of Tupac Amaru, was a revolt aimed at restoring a political order overturned by ill-advised and intrusive Bourbon reforms. In this sense, the aims of the rebels were similar to those of the rebels in the British colonies who wished to return to the world of 1763. The Comuneros at least, and probably also the Tupamaristas, for all the opacity of their leader's intentions, had no desire for a rupture with the crown, any more than the North American Patriots at the start of their rebellion. Exasperated by the activities and exactions of officials sent out to govern them from the metropolis, they did, however, want to secure a degree of control over their own affairs that would effectively ensure equality of status with peninsular Spain. For the British colonies, shaped by parliamentary tradition, equality of status with the mother country was conceived in terms of legislative autonomy in all matters of internal government. For the creoles of the bureaucratized world of Spanish America it was essentially administrative, and would be ensured by the appointment of locals, rather than peninsular Spaniards, to administrative and judicial posts.173

In both instances, however, what seemed to colonial elites like the realignment of a disturbed balance in the name of justice and equity appeared to the metropolitan centre to be a demand at pistol point for unacceptable change. To accede to such a demand would be to surrender imperial authority, and turn colonial subjects into the masters of their lands. At all costs, authority had to be upheld, and by force if need be. But where the British crown failed to reimpose its authority, in spite of the deployment of an army that at one moment was 50,000 strong,174 the Spanish crown succeeded in containing the crisis, even in New Granada where it lacked the military capability to take on the rebels.

Part of the explanation for the different outcomes is to be found in contingent circumstances. Of these the most important was the success of the North American rebels in securing the military and naval participation of France and Spain in their struggle. Although prophecies might circulate in the Andes about the restoration of Inca rule with the help of the English, there was not the remotest possibility at this juncture of English, or any other external support. Even if foreign powers had been willing and ready to help, logistics would have constituted an insuperable deterrent. The Spanish American rebellions occurred in regions remote from the seaboard, and isolated from each other by an implacable geography. North America itself was a world away and the English colonists were otherwise engaged. Even if the Comuneros drew inspiration from Tupac Amaru's uprising, that too was of no practical consequence for their own struggle. The viceroyalty of New Granada by itself was so fractured by geography that it took all Berbeo's political skills to prevent the resulting inter-regional and municipal rivalries from wrecking his coalition as he faced the decision as to whether to march on Bogota .171

Disunity, however, also haunted the leaders of rebellion in British America. They were confronted, like the Comunero leadership, with inter-regional rivalries, which were bridged but far from eradicated when the oligarchs of Virginian society decided to throw in their lot with the Massachusetts Patriots. They were faced, too, with the consequences of social divisions that may have been temporarily set aside in the wave of popular enthusiasm generated by the initial resistance to British demands, but which, like the regional divisions, inevitably resurfaced as the war went on. From 1777 onwards, it was the poor - landless labourers, the down-and-outs and blacks - who manned the Continental Army, and did so for the money rather than out of enthusiasm for the cause. Given the divisions both between and within the colonies, and the size of the Loyalist minority, a successful outcome to the Revolution was far from assured, and the part played by British political and strategic misjudgments may in the end have tipped the balance. 176

Ethnic divisions proved fatal to Tupac Amaru's rebellion. In this respect the North American rebel leaders had an easier task, since they did not have to hold together coalitions of whites, mestizos and Indians, each of these groups with an agenda of its own. By taking matters into their own hands, and attacking whites and their properties indiscriminately, the Andean Indians soon alienated creoles who had initially shown themselves sympathetic to Tupac Amaru's revolt. But in New Granada the Indians were less radical in their demands, and the savagery that accompanied the Peruvian rebellion was absent.177 To some extent this may have been the consequence of more capable leadership, although the rapidity with which the Comuneros achieved their aims saved New Granada from the kind of protracted civil war which inevitably leads to the escalation of hatreds and the perpetration of atrocities - something that occurred in North America as well as the Andes.171

Quality of leadership in any revolution is difficult to assess by any criterion other than the eventual outcome. From this perspective, the leaders of the North American rebellion appear to posterity to have been cast in a heroic mould. This makes it difficult to recapture the ambiguities, the hypocrisy and the personal tensions that lay behind the achievements of the North American Founding Fathers. 179 These, however, were men of experience in local life and politics, and the willingness of the colonial population to place its trust in men of experience to guide them through the turmoil of war and revolution gave them the space in which to develop their talents and justify that trust. In this sense, the degree of political participation to be found in pre-revolutionary North America was a vital element, both in forming a generation of leaders, and in providing them with the popular support which they needed to see their task through to the end.

The character of Spanish American society did not allow for this kind of popular participation in government, or create the accountability to an electorate which compelled the holders of public office to hone their political skills. A cacique like Tupac Amaru acquired his post through a combination of inheritance and appointment. Berbeo, although he possessed military experience and proved himself an outstanding leader, was not in fact a holder of municipal office - the usual and most obvious training ground for members of the creole elite.1S0

Yet if, as seems plausible, the majority of the North American Patriots initially hoped to preserve their liberties within the British Empire rather than press forward to independence, they failed to achieve their ends. From this point of view the Comunero Revolution came closer to the mark. The rebels secured major tax concessions from the royal authorities, and compelled them to act within the spirit of the unwritten constitution that in pre-Bourbon times had regulated the crown's relations with its American subjects. The visitor-general, Gutierrez de Pineres, was recalled to Madrid, and the plan to extend to New Granada the system of local intendancies was dropped.18' Even in Peru, where a pall of fear hung over the Andes after the savage repression of Tupac Amaru's rebellion, a crown now more than ever insistent on the divine nature of monarchy 112 was still prepared to manoeuvre and make concessions, partly in order to ward off the danger of more uprisings, but also as part of a genuine attempt to redress grievances. Unpopular officials, starting with the visitor-general Areche himself, were removed from their posts. The system of forced purchase of goods by Indians was abolished, labour services were modified, and, as Tupac Amaru had demanded, an Audiencia was established in Cuzco. In the end, many of the Indian caciques due to be deprived of their positions managed to retain them by having recourse to the courts.'"'

The ability of the Spanish crown to contain the crisis indicates the continuing strength and resilience of the imperial structure, in spite of all the strains imposed upon it by the Bourbon reforms. The institutions of imperial government had become deeply embedded in the Hispanic American world, as they had not in British America. Although colonial elites in the Spanish Indies might often ignore and sometimes actively defy royal commands, they themselves formed part of a complex system of institutional structures and patronage networks stretching downwards from the king.

Traditionally, this system also possessed a self-correcting mechanism in the form of checks and balances. Petition and protest by the aggrieved, followed by intense bargaining and mutual concessions within an accepted legal and constitutional framework, was the accepted way of proceeding. When this failed, armed revolt could be represented as a legitimate last resort. This in turn, however, was expected to trigger a fresh round of bargaining. Both the rebellion of the Comuneros and the authorities' response conformed perfectly to this traditional pattern. This was a rebellion imbued with traditional notions of contract and the common good, and the authorities reverted to traditional Habsburg methods when they took steps to reaffirm the common good once the rebellion was at an end.

How little the Comunero uprising was touched by Enlightenment ideology is suggested by a pasquinade posted in Bogota in April 1781: `... these days, books destructive of the whole spirit of ecclesiastical immunity are permitted ... In former times Spaniards coming to the Indies used to teach good, civil customs, but those who arrive today simply teach new sins, heretical maxims and had habits ... The pasquinade then went on to denounce the schemes put forward by royal officials for the reform of higher education and the foundation of a university offering a modern curriculum.184 It was the authorities who wished to promote the cause of the Enlightenment in the face of resistance from society. Once the Comunero rebellion was over, it was again authority, in the person of Archbishop Caballero y Gongora as viceroy, which pressed ahead with educational reform. Later the administration was to reap the reward of its educational efforts when it found itself confronted by a new generation all too willing to embrace foreign and revolutionary ideas.'85

These inflammatory foreign doctrines found their realization in the American and French revolutions, which aspired to put into practice political ideas that had long formed the subject of passionate European debate. Their exposure to that debate gave the leaders of the North American rebellion access to a wider set of political and cultural traditions than those enjoyed by their Spanish American counterparts in the 1770s. This in turn is likely to have enhanced their capacity to adjust their positions in the light of evolving events and to come up with new solutions when obstacles blocked their path. The eventual outcome was a genuinely new political creation - an independent federal republic on a potentially continental scale.

The intellectual resourcefulness displayed by the American Patriots once they had taken the decision to break with the British crown made them a difficult enemy to defeat. Even in the worst moments of the war they could sustain morale by holding before the people the vision of independence, and with it the hope of ushering in `a New Order of the Ages'. In reply to this Britain had little to offer but the commercial and practical benefits that would flow from a return to loyalty and the ending of the war.

Although the British entered that war determined to uphold imperial authority, even at the price of fighting their own kith and kin, the suppression of the rebellion moved to second place in their list of priorities following France's entry into the conflict in 1778. The immediate priority was now the protection of the West Indies from French attack. In the changed circumstances even George III began to weaken in his obstinate determination to bring the Americans to heel. It was, he felt, `so desirable to end the war with that country, to be enabled with redoubled ardour to avenge the faithless and insolent conduct of France ...'186

Although it now became possible to contemplate the eventual granting of independence to the Americans, Lord North's ministry, in spite of internal opposition and the rise of domestic discontents, successfully kept the country at war with the nascent republic right up to the time of his fall from power in February 1782.187 The surrender at Yorktown, however, in October 1781 destroyed any realistic prospect of recovering the colonies, and when the Rockingham administration came to office it was determined to wind up the American war. The loss of the thirteen colonies was a bitter pill to swallow, but its effects were tempered by the retention of Canada and the West Indies, and still more by the emerging prospects of a new and greater empire in India and the East.

For Spain, on the other hand, there was no alternative empire in prospect if its American possessions should be lost. Deprived of the silver of Mexico and Peru, what kind of future awaited it? The crown therefore remained totally committed to the retention of its American empire and to the continuing development of American resources for the benefit of the mother country. At the same time, the revolts in New Granada and Peru administered a drastic shock to the system. Manuel Godoy, the future first minister of Charles IV of Spain, was later to write in his memoirs: `Nobody is unaware how close we were to losing in the years 1781-2 the whole viceroyalty of Peru and part of La Plata, when the famous Condorcanqui raised the standard of rebellion ... The swell from this storm was felt with more or less strength in New Granada, and even reached New Spain.""

The shock of the storm was made all the worse by the coincidence of the rebellions in Spain's empire with the winning of independence by Britain's American colonies. The implications of the American Revolution for the Spanish viceroyalties frightened the Spanish ministers. It also frightened the Count of Aranda, who, after losing ministerial office, had watched the development of events from a ringside seat as ambassador to France. In a secret memorandum of 1783, following the signing of the Peace of Versailles, he warned Charles III that `it has never been possible to retain for long such large possessions at such enormous distances from the metropolis.' Presciently he argued that the new United States, although for the present a pygmy, would grow into a giant which would first want to absorb Florida and then would cast covetous eyes on New Spain. In order to save what could be saved of Spain's Atlantic empire he therefore proposed that mainland America should be divided into three independent kingdoms - Mexico, Peru and the remaining mainland territories - each to be ruled by a prince of the Spanish royal house, while the King of Spain himself assumed the title of Emperor. Each kingdom would make an annual contribution to the Spanish crown in the form of precious metals or colonial produce, and the Spanish and American royal houses would intermarry in perpetuity.189