Short Teaching Module: Gender and Race in Colonial Latin America

Gender and Race in Colonial Latin America: “‘The Most Vile Atrocities’: Accusations of Slander Against María Cofignie, Parda Libre (Louisiana, 1795)”

Annotation

INTRODUCTION Spain obtained the province of Louisiana from France according to provisions of the Treaty of Paris, signed in 1763, and effectively ruled it from 1769 until 1803. Louisiana had been part of the French colonial system since 1699, and with its acquisition the Spanish Crown found itself in a situation to which it was not accustomed: taking over, rather than giving up, American territory from another European power. For both the French and Spanish, Louisiana's value was mainly strategic. The Bourbon monarchs viewed the colony as useful primarily within the context of larger geopolitical considerations: neither wanted Britain to seize it. Although Spain, like France, considered Louisiana an economic burden, the Spanish Crown hoped to use it as a protective barrier between mineral-rich New Spain and England's increasingly aggressive North American colonies. Founded in 1718 on the site of a long-established Native American portage point where the Mississippi River comes closest to the shores of Lake Pontchartrain, New Orleans was colonial Louisiana's principal urban center and port. The furs, hides, timber, and agricultural products of the Mississippi Valley region flowed through the city en route to the West Indies, the North American colonies, New Spain, and occasionally Europe. New Orleans also served as the entrepot for slaves and various goods such as flour and cloth that colonials could not supply or manufacture themselves. By the late eighteenth century "the city that care forgot"1 was a vibrant port, with people moving in and out, establishing relationships across racial and class boundaries, and generally challenging any kind of stable social order. The only nucleus to boast the title of ciudad (city) in all of northern New Spain, New Orleans had a resident population that grew from about three thousand to more than eight thousand during the era of Spanish rule, with a large transient population adding to this number. The percentage of libres (free blacks)2 rose from 10 to 20 percent of New Orleanians over the same period; the rest of the population was about evenly divided between whites and slaves, with varying numbers of indios (Indians) and mestizos (persons of mixed Indian and white ancestry) residing in and around the city.3 When Spain assumed control of Louisiana, it installed its own officials, legal codes, and governing system.4 The top administrator in the province was the governor general, and he, along with two alcaldes (judges) from the cabildo (city council), headed tribunals that heard civil and criminal cases originating in New Orleans or appealed from outlying posts. Decisions in these cases could in turn be appealed to the cabildo as a whole, and then on to the Audiencia of Santo Domingo, for litigants who were ordinary citizens, or to the governor of Cuba for those who held special privileges (fueros), such as members of the military or clergy. 5 An escribano (clerk or scribe) recorded all court proceedings. Most of the cases the governor and alcaldes heard make up a collection known as the "Spanish Judicial Records," which along with the "French Judicial Records" (those of the French Superior Council), are housed at the Louisiana State Museum Historical Center in New Orleans.6 . The case of "Criminal Proceedings Pursued by don Pedro Favrot against Maria Cofignie, Free Parda, Concerning Slander,"7 most of which is translated in the following pages,8 came before the governor general, Francisco Luis Hector, el Baron de Carondelet, in June 1795. The governor usually adjudicated criminal cases, especially those in which one of the parties was favored with the fuero military (judicial privileges granted to military personnel); the plaintiff Favrot was a captain in the fixed or permanent infantry regiment of Louisiana. When Cofignie allegedly insulted and harangued his daughter and indirectly his wife, Favrot petitioned the governor's court for redress. His original petition was written in French, the language of most New Orleanians, and translated into Spanish by Public Interpreter don Juan Josef Duforest. Favrot presented the testimony of two witnesses, and based on this evidence Carondelet placed Cofignie under house arrest because there was no women's prison at the time. Cofignie in turn provided her version of the events and played on the sympathies of the court as a poor single working mother with several children to support. Eventually Favrot settled for an apology to his wife and daughter, which Cofignie reluctantly made. The Spanish judicial system thus successfully mediated between competing interests to reach an acceptable compromise, while taking into account the race, status, and gender of each party. As in the Favrot-Cofignie case, the courts typically encouraged plaintiffs and defendants to reconcile their differences and admonished them to act according to acceptable rules of conduct. Cofignie, however, did not give up fighting for what she believed to be just causes. The same month that Favrot brought charges against her, she petitioned a tribunal for the freedom of her brother, Antonio Cofignie. Antonio was a slave of Maria's former mistress, the widow of Maria and Antonio's white father, don Claudio Cofignie. It appears that don Claudio had verbally promised to give each of his three illegitimate children (Maria, Feliciana, and Antonio), born to his slave Luison, 400 pesos to purchase their freedom. The girls had done so before don Claudio Cofignie's death in 1786, but Antonio had not, and now the widow refused to free him for that amount, demanding instead what Maria claimed to be an exorbitant sum. While Maria was in the process of seeking retribution, Antonio took matters into his own hands and ran away. His mistress then accused Maria of assisting Antonio and hiding him; ironically, Maria, who obviously placed much faith in the legal system, was thrown in jail once more, where she again called on the mercy of the court as a pobre mujer to release her so that she could support her family. Finally, a white planter in Opelousas, Louisiana, whose ties to the Cofignies are not clear, paid 1,100 pesos for the fugitive, with the promise that Maria would reimburse him that sum if her brother ever reappeared.9 As a single mother, Maria also struggled to care for her children. During the era of Spanish rule in New Orleans, Cofignie bore eight babies, the first in 1785 and the last in 1801; of these, three died in their youth. She had another daughter in 1806. The father of only one of Cofignie’s children was identified in existing documents. Her son Josef Urra, a cuarterón libre born November 1797, was described in his baptismal record as the illegitimate son of Manuel Urra and the parda libre Maria Cofignie.10 Although Cofignie repeatedly appealed for mercy based on the fact that she had to work to support these numerous children, court records and censuses do not indicate her occupation. The most common jobs for free black women in New Orleans in the 1790s were laundress, seamstress, and seller; Cofignie most likely earned her living in one of these ways. Many of those individuals who tested the boundaries of elite-defined acceptable behavior were free blacks like Maria Cofignie. Their position within New Orleans's hierarchy was not well defined, and, in fact, most libres did not choose to be demarcated as a separate group, preferring instead to be admitted to, and accepted by, white society. Although radicalized by the possibilities for equality with whites seemingly offered in the philosophies of the French and Haitian Revolutions, free blacks in New Orleans generally wanted to reform, not overthrow, the hierarchical Spanish social system that condemned them outright for being nonwhites and that failed to recognize their worth except as measured by skin color. Their challenges escalated in the revolutionary decades of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.11 The case that follows reveals many of these tensions. In their recorded statements, the litigants raise the issue of racial discrimination and comment, often implicitly, on distinct notions of personal honor, patriarchy, family, gender roles, and the meaning of freedom. Like all libres living in slave societies, New Orleans free women of color operated from an undefined, anomalous position, the middle section of a three-tiered hierarchy in which they were not truly free or slave, often not pure black or white. Libre women were also trapped in a patriarchal so that valued males more than females but that did not afford them the paternal protection due the weaker sex because ostensibly they did not possess honor and virtue, attributes only accorded whites. But as we will see in the following testimony, Maria Cofignie and other libre women did not suffer in silence. This source is a part of the Gender and Race in Colonial Latin America teaching module.

Scandal at the Church: José de Alfaro Accuses Doña Theresa Bravo and Others of Insulting and Beating His Castiza Wife, Joséfa Cadena (Mexico, 1782)

Annotation

Systems of honor in colonial Mexico meant that insults were more than just Swords. Utterances that defamed men and women of good reputation had to be answered or the slight to their personal status within the community would be permanent. Gossip underscored these taints, and although usually not as open, it could serve the same purpose as insults. Local elites believed that systems of honor applied only to them because only they could possess the high status that derived from their superior birth and lineage. From their vantage point at the apex of society, they looked down upon an undistinguished mass of commoners whose lack of virtue was patently clear and whose status could only be dishonorable. Yet, from the other end of the social spectrum plebeians also conceived themselves as possessors of honor. They might not compare themselves to a duke or a count, but within their local society they derived honor from proper conduct, legitimate birth, and sexual propriety. This honor was important in their every day dealings, since they often needed credit and aid from neighbors and friends and thus depended upon relationships of trust. Moreover, plebeians distinguish between various hues of racial categories, which they associated with greater lesser honor. While their perceptions varied from those of the dominant elite, plebeian self-identities were nevertheless important. Although insults to an individual’s honor had to be answered, reactions differed according to the circumstances. Could a social inferior attack and beat a social superior who had insulted him or her? Was a petition to the courts really a satisfactory rebuttal? In the document that follows, you will read how Theresa Bravo, an elite woman, reacted to inferences about her marital fidelity and how José de Alfaro, a plebeian husband, responded when doña Theresa beat and insulted his wife. Their individual perceptions of the incident in question differed considerably, not only because they were opponents in a lawsuit, but also because of their distinct social standing. There is much left unsaid in this document. For example, José de Alfaro, the plaintiff, seems to believe that he can advance his cause by harnessing ill feeling toward don Diego Fernandez, doña Theresa’s husband and a colonial official. It is also clear that José de Alfaro holds don Diego Fernandez directly responsible for the conduct of his wife, though doña Theresa’s precipitous actions and don Diego’s lackluster control over her brought dishonor onto his name. Yet, this was a plebeian perspective—part of the confusion of differing points-of-view found in this criminal complaint. Documents such as this one are tantalizing because they allow us a glimpse of the tensions within a small town. But many criminal records are fragmentary and, just like this one, do not provide the whole file. In this document we see José de Alfaro and his witnesses argue his case, but we do not have the other side represented. We have to guess at how don Diego would defend himself and how this incident was resolved. No verdict is recorded, and so this case, like so many fliers, is instructive without providing a definitive resolution. It shows us the incisions in a small Mexican town and how women and men dealt with assaults against their name and body. It hints at larger issues, such as don Diego’s status within the town, but these are left hanging. The setting of the document, the town of San Juan Teotihuacán, in the valley of Mexico, also warrants some consideration. Although a major town of the region, and near the famous pyramids of the same name, the town, by the late eighteenth century, had become part of the intendancy of Mexico City. Thus, although a cabecera, it was within the orbit of the largest city of the colony. It was, however, not large. In 1791 a census recorded 895 people of Spanish descent, 388 mestizos, and 266 mulattos. Another count, done in 1804, noted 1,814 Indian tributaries.1 Clearly San Juan Teotihuacán was large enough to have a varied, racially mixed population, but small enough that people knew each other and personal nor was vital to plebeians and elites equally. This source is a part of the Gender and Race in Colonial Latin America teaching module.

Gender and Race in Colonial Latin America: “Don Manuel Valdivieso y Carrión Protests the marriage of His Daughter to Don Teodoro Jaramillo, a Person of Lower Social Standing (Quito, 1784-85)”

Annotation

INTRODUCTION Until the mid-eighteenth century, the church regulated the institution of marriage in Spanish America, emphasizing the freedom of individuals to marry according to their will and, if necessary, independently of their parents' consent. However, on March 23, 1776, the Spanish Crown introduced its own legislation, the Royal Pragmatic (Real Pragmática), to assert control over this important social institution. By 1778 the Crown had applied the Pragmatic to all of its colonies, and in subsequent years it issued a series of explanatory guidelines and supplementary decrees) The Royal Pragmatic sought to protect families from socially "unequal" marries a thus to preserve the traditional hierarchical social order. It required that children now obtain permission to marry from their father or, in his absence, from their mother, grandparents, or nearest adult relative or guardian. In cases where they married without parental authorization, the law allowed for their disinheritance. The Royal Pragmatic resulted in a groundswell of lawsuits that contested its new regulations on legally acceptable marriages. The records of these lawsuits constitute a rich documentary source, one that offers important insights into contemporary views of inequality and the hierarchical ordering of regional social structures. Concepts of honor and nobility primarily determined the most important social distinctions, though they were in turn affected (and defined) by a number of other factors, including ethnicity and occupation. The following document excerpts are part of a lawsuit tried before the Audiencia of Quito in 1784 and 1785, just six years after the Royal Pragmatic was promulgated in the Americas. The suit was initiated by Manuel Valdivieso y Carrión, a vecino (citizen) of Loja, a city located in the southern highlands of the audiencia district. In April 1784, Valdivieso wrote a letter to the audiencia president asking him to intervene in a dispute he had with Juan Teodoro Jaramillo; Valdivieso argued that Jaramillo, also a vecino of Loja, was of low social standing and had seduced his daughter Baltasara into marriage. For Valdivieso, such a marriage was clearly an offense under the Royal Pragmatica and would greatly dishonor his family; it had to be prevented at all costs. As the audiencia superior court could only accept the case as an appeal from a lower provincial court, the president passed the suit down to the corregidor of Loja. At this point, Jaramillo formally challenged the legal basis of Valdivieso's case, arguing against the notion that he and his elected bride were socially unequal. He insisted that the marriage take place. After completing his investigation, but apparently without pronouncing a sentence, the corregidor sent the accumulated court records back to the audiencia in Quito. The case ultimately generated extensive documentation; the court records fill 268 manuscript pages (134 folios). The case file includes copies or summaries of the documents presented to the court in Quito and the corregidor in Loja, the closing statements made by the lawyers representing the two parties in the suit, and finally the argument of the fiscal (crown attorney). While the litigation contains the arguments made in support of both Valdivieso and Jaramillo, the transcripts provide only slight evidence of Baltasara's point of view. Within the document summaries prepared by the Loja corregidor, there does appear Baltasara’s statement that she had left her father's house after he had withdrawn his earlier consent to the marriage. While we lack the final decision of the audiencia and therefore do not know how the dispute turned out, we do know the fiscal’s recommendations. In October 1785, drawing extensively on the points made by Jaramillo's attorney, the fiscal argued that the court should rule against Valdivieso's opposition to the marriage of his daughter with Jaramillo. He refuted the position that there was a considerable social distance between the two parties, and he stressed as well the consent Valdivieso had given to the marriage before his change of mind led to the dispute. In the following excerpts the two parties present their opposing points of view. The first section contains a summary of previously recorded testimony prepared for the court on behalf of Valdivieso y Carrión. The summary condenses the depositions of ten witnesses who had responded to a lengthy set of questions designed to elicit testimony that would prove Jaramillo's social inferiority.2 The court summary is followed by the detailed statements of the two opposing attorneys in the case, each laying out the legal basis of their client's claim. The Cast of Characters The following list of the main characters in the lawsuit and their kinship ties should help in negotiating the complex familial relationships referred to in the case: Manuel Valdivieso y Carrión: the plaintiff in the suit. Teodoro Jaramillo: the defendant in the suit. Baltasara Valdivieso: Manuel's daughter and Teodoro's betrothed. Juan Jaramillo and María Regalado y Lopez: Teodoro's parents. Bartolo Galvez: María Regalado's second husband. José and Francisca: two of María's children who she had with other men (one of whom was named Tomás Aguirre). Francisco Jaramillo: Teodoro's paternal uncle. Juan Jaramillo and Margarita González: Teodoro's paternal grandparents. Francisco Jaramillo: Teodoro's paternal great-uncle. Pedro Regalado y Greta: Teodoro's maternal grandfather. Esteban (Regalado y?) Ureña: Teodoro's maternal uncle. Joséfa Córdova: Teodoro's former wife. José de Herique: Teodoro's close friend. This source is a part of the Gender and Race in Colonial Latin America teaching module.

Gender and Race in Colonial Latin America: “‘The Most Vile Atrocities’: Accusations of Slander Against María Cofignie, Parda Libre (Louisiana, 1795)”

Annotation

INTRODUCTION Spain obtained the province of Louisiana from France according to provisions of the Treaty of Paris, signed in 1763, and effectively ruled it from 1769 until 1803. Louisiana had been part of the French colonial system since 1699, and with its acquisition the Spanish Crown found itself in a situation to which it was not accustomed: taking over, rather than giving up, American territory from another European power. For both the French and Spanish, Louisiana's value was mainly strategic. The Bourbon monarchs viewed the colony as useful primarily within the context of larger geopolitical considerations: neither wanted Britain to seize it. Although Spain, like France, considered Louisiana an economic burden, the Spanish Crown hoped to use it as a protective barrier between mineral-rich New Spain and England's increasingly aggressive North American colonies. Founded in 1718 on the site of a long-established Native American portage point where the Mississippi River comes closest to the shores of Lake Pontchartrain, New Orleans was colonial Louisiana's principal urban center and port. The furs, hides, timber, and agricultural products of the Mississippi Valley region flowed through the city en route to the West Indies, the North American colonies, New Spain, and occasionally Europe. New Orleans also served as the entrepot for slaves and various goods such as flour and cloth that colonials could not supply or manufacture themselves. By the late eighteenth century "the city that care forgot"1 was a vibrant port, with people moving in and out, establishing relationships across racial and class boundaries, and generally challenging any kind of stable social order. The only nucleus to boast the title of ciudad (city) in all of northern New Spain, New Orleans had a resident population that grew from about three thousand to more than eight thousand during the era of Spanish rule, with a large transient population adding to this number. The percentage of libres (free blacks)2 rose from 10 to 20 percent of New Orleanians over the same period; the rest of the population was about evenly divided between whites and slaves, with varying numbers of indios (Indians) and mestizos (persons of mixed Indian and white ancestry) residing in and around the city.3 When Spain assumed control of Louisiana, it installed its own officials, legal codes, and governing system.4 The top administrator in the province was the governor general, and he, along with two alcaldes (judges) from the cabildo (city council), headed tribunals that heard civil and criminal cases originating in New Orleans or appealed from outlying posts. Decisions in these cases could in turn be appealed to the cabildo as a whole, and then on to the Audiencia of Santo Domingo, for litigants who were ordinary citizens, or to the governor of Cuba for those who held special privileges (fueros), such as members of the military or clergy. 5 An escribano (clerk or scribe) recorded all court proceedings. Most of the cases the governor and alcaldes heard make up a collection known as the "Spanish Judicial Records," which along with the "French Judicial Records" (those of the French Superior Council), are housed at the Louisiana State Museum Historical Center in New Orleans.6 . The case of "Criminal Proceedings Pursued by don Pedro Favrot against Maria Cofignie, Free Parda, Concerning Slander,"7 most of which is translated in the following pages,8 came before the governor general, Francisco Luis Hector, el Baron de Carondelet, in June 1795. The governor usually adjudicated criminal cases, especially those in which one of the parties was favored with the fuero military (judicial privileges granted to military personnel); the plaintiff Favrot was a captain in the fixed or permanent infantry regiment of Louisiana. When Cofignie allegedly insulted and harangued his daughter and indirectly his wife, Favrot petitioned the governor's court for redress. His original petition was written in French, the language of most New Orleanians, and translated into Spanish by Public Interpreter don Juan Josef Duforest. Favrot presented the testimony of two witnesses, and based on this evidence Carondelet placed Cofignie under house arrest because there was no women's prison at the time. Cofignie in turn provided her version of the events and played on the sympathies of the court as a poor single working mother with several children to support. Eventually Favrot settled for an apology to his wife and daughter, which Cofignie reluctantly made. The Spanish judicial system thus successfully mediated between competing interests to reach an acceptable compromise, while taking into account the race, status, and gender of each party. As in the Favrot-Cofignie case, the courts typically encouraged plaintiffs and defendants to reconcile their differences and admonished them to act according to acceptable rules of conduct. Cofignie, however, did not give up fighting for what she believed to be just causes. The same month that Favrot brought charges against her, she petitioned a tribunal for the freedom of her brother, Antonio Cofignie. Antonio was a slave of Maria's former mistress, the widow of Maria and Antonio's white father, don Claudio Cofignie. It appears that don Claudio had verbally promised to give each of his three illegitimate children (Maria, Feliciana, and Antonio), born to his slave Luison, 400 pesos to purchase their freedom. The girls had done so before don Claudio Cofignie's death in 1786, but Antonio had not, and now the widow refused to free him for that amount, demanding instead what Maria claimed to be an exorbitant sum. While Maria was in the process of seeking retribution, Antonio took matters into his own hands and ran away. His mistress then accused Maria of assisting Antonio and hiding him; ironically, Maria, who obviously placed much faith in the legal system, was thrown in jail once more, where she again called on the mercy of the court as a pobre mujer to release her so that she could support her family. Finally, a white planter in Opelousas, Louisiana, whose ties to the Cofignies are not clear, paid 1,100 pesos for the fugitive, with the promise that Maria would reimburse him that sum if her brother ever reappeared.9 As a single mother, Maria also struggled to care for her children. During the era of Spanish rule in New Orleans, Cofignie bore eight babies, the first in 1785 and the last in 1801; of these, three died in their youth. She had another daughter in 1806. The father of only one of Cofignie’s children was identified in existing documents. Her son Josef Urra, a cuarterón libre born November 1797, was described in his baptismal record as the illegitimate son of Manuel Urra and the parda libre Maria Cofignie.10 Although Cofignie repeatedly appealed for mercy based on the fact that she had to work to support these numerous children, court records and censuses do not indicate her occupation. The most common jobs for free black women in New Orleans in the 1790s were laundress, seamstress, and seller; Cofignie most likely earned her living in one of these ways. Many of those individuals who tested the boundaries of elite-defined acceptable behavior were free blacks like Maria Cofignie. Their position within New Orleans's hierarchy was not well defined, and, in fact, most libres did not choose to be demarcated as a separate group, preferring instead to be admitted to, and accepted by, white society. Although radicalized by the possibilities for equality with whites seemingly offered in the philosophies of the French and Haitian Revolutions, free blacks in New Orleans generally wanted to reform, not overthrow, the hierarchical Spanish social system that condemned them outright for being nonwhites and that failed to recognize their worth except as measured by skin color. Their challenges escalated in the revolutionary decades of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.11 The case that follows reveals many of these tensions. In their recorded statements, the litigants raise the issue of racial discrimination and comment, often implicitly, on distinct notions of personal honor, patriarchy, family, gender roles, and the meaning of freedom. Like all libres living in slave societies, New Orleans free women of color operated from an undefined, anomalous position, the middle section of a three-tiered hierarchy in which they were not truly free or slave, often not pure black or white. Libre women were also trapped in a patriarchal so that valued males more than females but that did not afford them the paternal protection due the weaker sex because ostensibly they did not possess honor and virtue, attributes only accorded whites. But as we will see in the following testimony, Maria Cofignie and other libre women did not suffer in silence. This source is a part of the Gender and Race in Colonial Latin America teaching module.

Scandal at the Church: José de Alfaro Accuses Doña Theresa Bravo and Others of Insulting and Beating His Castiza Wife, Joséfa Cadena (Mexico, 1782)

Annotation

Systems of honor in colonial Mexico meant that insults were more than just Swords. Utterances that defamed men and women of good reputation had to be answered or the slight to their personal status within the community would be permanent. Gossip underscored these taints, and although usually not as open, it could serve the same purpose as insults. Local elites believed that systems of honor applied only to them because only they could possess the high status that derived from their superior birth and lineage. From their vantage point at the apex of society, they looked down upon an undistinguished mass of commoners whose lack of virtue was patently clear and whose status could only be dishonorable. Yet, from the other end of the social spectrum plebeians also conceived themselves as possessors of honor. They might not compare themselves to a duke or a count, but within their local society they derived honor from proper conduct, legitimate birth, and sexual propriety. This honor was important in their every day dealings, since they often needed credit and aid from neighbors and friends and thus depended upon relationships of trust. Moreover, plebeians distinguish between various hues of racial categories, which they associated with greater lesser honor. While their perceptions varied from those of the dominant elite, plebeian self-identities were nevertheless important. Although insults to an individual’s honor had to be answered, reactions differed according to the circumstances. Could a social inferior attack and beat a social superior who had insulted him or her? Was a petition to the courts really a satisfactory rebuttal? In the document that follows, you will read how Theresa Bravo, an elite woman, reacted to inferences about her marital fidelity and how José de Alfaro, a plebeian husband, responded when doña Theresa beat and insulted his wife. Their individual perceptions of the incident in question differed considerably, not only because they were opponents in a lawsuit, but also because of their distinct social standing. There is much left unsaid in this document. For example, José de Alfaro, the plaintiff, seems to believe that he can advance his cause by harnessing ill feeling toward don Diego Fernandez, doña Theresa’s husband and a colonial official. It is also clear that José de Alfaro holds don Diego Fernandez directly responsible for the conduct of his wife, though doña Theresa’s precipitous actions and don Diego’s lackluster control over her brought dishonor onto his name. Yet, this was a plebeian perspective—part of the confusion of differing points-of-view found in this criminal complaint. Documents such as this one are tantalizing because they allow us a glimpse of the tensions within a small town. But many criminal records are fragmentary and, just like this one, do not provide the whole file. In this document we see José de Alfaro and his witnesses argue his case, but we do not have the other side represented. We have to guess at how don Diego would defend himself and how this incident was resolved. No verdict is recorded, and so this case, like so many fliers, is instructive without providing a definitive resolution. It shows us the incisions in a small Mexican town and how women and men dealt with assaults against their name and body. It hints at larger issues, such as don Diego’s status within the town, but these are left hanging. The setting of the document, the town of San Juan Teotihuacán, in the valley of Mexico, also warrants some consideration. Although a major town of the region, and near the famous pyramids of the same name, the town, by the late eighteenth century, had become part of the intendancy of Mexico City. Thus, although a cabecera, it was within the orbit of the largest city of the colony. It was, however, not large. In 1791 a census recorded 895 people of Spanish descent, 388 mestizos, and 266 mulattos. Another count, done in 1804, noted 1,814 Indian tributaries.1 Clearly San Juan Teotihuacán was large enough to have a varied, racially mixed population, but small enough that people knew each other and personal nor was vital to plebeians and elites equally. This source is a part of the Gender and Race in Colonial Latin America teaching module.

Gender and Race in Colonial Latin America: “Don Manuel Valdivieso y Carrión Protests the marriage of His Daughter to Don Teodoro Jaramillo, a Person of Lower Social Standing (Quito, 1784-85)”

Annotation

INTRODUCTION Until the mid-eighteenth century, the church regulated the institution of marriage in Spanish America, emphasizing the freedom of individuals to marry according to their will and, if necessary, independently of their parents' consent. However, on March 23, 1776, the Spanish Crown introduced its own legislation, the Royal Pragmatic (Real Pragmática), to assert control over this important social institution. By 1778 the Crown had applied the Pragmatic to all of its colonies, and in subsequent years it issued a series of explanatory guidelines and supplementary decrees) The Royal Pragmatic sought to protect families from socially "unequal" marries a thus to preserve the traditional hierarchical social order. It required that children now obtain permission to marry from their father or, in his absence, from their mother, grandparents, or nearest adult relative or guardian. In cases where they married without parental authorization, the law allowed for their disinheritance. The Royal Pragmatic resulted in a groundswell of lawsuits that contested its new regulations on legally acceptable marriages. The records of these lawsuits constitute a rich documentary source, one that offers important insights into contemporary views of inequality and the hierarchical ordering of regional social structures. Concepts of honor and nobility primarily determined the most important social distinctions, though they were in turn affected (and defined) by a number of other factors, including ethnicity and occupation. The following document excerpts are part of a lawsuit tried before the Audiencia of Quito in 1784 and 1785, just six years after the Royal Pragmatic was promulgated in the Americas. The suit was initiated by Manuel Valdivieso y Carrión, a vecino (citizen) of Loja, a city located in the southern highlands of the audiencia district. In April 1784, Valdivieso wrote a letter to the audiencia president asking him to intervene in a dispute he had with Juan Teodoro Jaramillo; Valdivieso argued that Jaramillo, also a vecino of Loja, was of low social standing and had seduced his daughter Baltasara into marriage. For Valdivieso, such a marriage was clearly an offense under the Royal Pragmatica and would greatly dishonor his family; it had to be prevented at all costs. As the audiencia superior court could only accept the case as an appeal from a lower provincial court, the president passed the suit down to the corregidor of Loja. At this point, Jaramillo formally challenged the legal basis of Valdivieso's case, arguing against the notion that he and his elected bride were socially unequal. He insisted that the marriage take place. After completing his investigation, but apparently without pronouncing a sentence, the corregidor sent the accumulated court records back to the audiencia in Quito. The case ultimately generated extensive documentation; the court records fill 268 manuscript pages (134 folios). The case file includes copies or summaries of the documents presented to the court in Quito and the corregidor in Loja, the closing statements made by the lawyers representing the two parties in the suit, and finally the argument of the fiscal (crown attorney). While the litigation contains the arguments made in support of both Valdivieso and Jaramillo, the transcripts provide only slight evidence of Baltasara's point of view. Within the document summaries prepared by the Loja corregidor, there does appear Baltasara’s statement that she had left her father's house after he had withdrawn his earlier consent to the marriage. While we lack the final decision of the audiencia and therefore do not know how the dispute turned out, we do know the fiscal’s recommendations. In October 1785, drawing extensively on the points made by Jaramillo's attorney, the fiscal argued that the court should rule against Valdivieso's opposition to the marriage of his daughter with Jaramillo. He refuted the position that there was a considerable social distance between the two parties, and he stressed as well the consent Valdivieso had given to the marriage before his change of mind led to the dispute. In the following excerpts the two parties present their opposing points of view. The first section contains a summary of previously recorded testimony prepared for the court on behalf of Valdivieso y Carrión. The summary condenses the depositions of ten witnesses who had responded to a lengthy set of questions designed to elicit testimony that would prove Jaramillo's social inferiority.2 The court summary is followed by the detailed statements of the two opposing attorneys in the case, each laying out the legal basis of their client's claim. The Cast of Characters The following list of the main characters in the lawsuit and their kinship ties should help in negotiating the complex familial relationships referred to in the case: Manuel Valdivieso y Carrión: the plaintiff in the suit. Teodoro Jaramillo: the defendant in the suit. Baltasara Valdivieso: Manuel's daughter and Teodoro's betrothed. Juan Jaramillo and María Regalado y Lopez: Teodoro's parents. Bartolo Galvez: María Regalado's second husband. José and Francisca: two of María's children who she had with other men (one of whom was named Tomás Aguirre). Francisco Jaramillo: Teodoro's paternal uncle. Juan Jaramillo and Margarita González: Teodoro's paternal grandparents. Francisco Jaramillo: Teodoro's paternal great-uncle. Pedro Regalado y Greta: Teodoro's maternal grandfather. Esteban (Regalado y?) Ureña: Teodoro's maternal uncle. Joséfa Córdova: Teodoro's former wife. José de Herique: Teodoro's close friend. This source is a part of the Gender and Race in Colonial Latin America teaching module.

Gender and Race in Colonial Latin America: “‘The Most Vile Atrocities’: Accusations of Slander Against María Cofignie, Parda Libre (Louisiana, 1795)”

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INTRODUCTION Spain obtained the province of Louisiana from France according to provisions of the Treaty of Paris, signed in 1763, and effectively ruled it from 1769 until 1803. Louisiana had been part of the French colonial system since 1699, and with its acquisition the Spanish Crown found itself in a situation to which it was not accustomed: taking over, rather than giving up, American territory from another European power. For both the French and Spanish, Louisiana's value was mainly strategic. The Bourbon monarchs viewed the colony as useful primarily within the context of larger geopolitical considerations: neither wanted Britain to seize it. Although Spain, like France, considered Louisiana an economic burden, the Spanish Crown hoped to use it as a protective barrier between mineral-rich New Spain and England's increasingly aggressive North American colonies. Founded in 1718 on the site of a long-established Native American portage point where the Mississippi River comes closest to the shores of Lake Pontchartrain, New Orleans was colonial Louisiana's principal urban center and port. The furs, hides, timber, and agricultural products of the Mississippi Valley region flowed through the city en route to the West Indies, the North American colonies, New Spain, and occasionally Europe. New Orleans also served as the entrepot for slaves and various goods such as flour and cloth that colonials could not supply or manufacture themselves. By the late eighteenth century "the city that care forgot"1 was a vibrant port, with people moving in and out, establishing relationships across racial and class boundaries, and generally challenging any kind of stable social order. The only nucleus to boast the title of ciudad (city) in all of northern New Spain, New Orleans had a resident population that grew from about three thousand to more than eight thousand during the era of Spanish rule, with a large transient population adding to this number. The percentage of libres (free blacks)2 rose from 10 to 20 percent of New Orleanians over the same period; the rest of the population was about evenly divided between whites and slaves, with varying numbers of indios (Indians) and mestizos (persons of mixed Indian and white ancestry) residing in and around the city.3 When Spain assumed control of Louisiana, it installed its own officials, legal codes, and governing system.4 The top administrator in the province was the governor general, and he, along with two alcaldes (judges) from the cabildo (city council), headed tribunals that heard civil and criminal cases originating in New Orleans or appealed from outlying posts. Decisions in these cases could in turn be appealed to the cabildo as a whole, and then on to the Audiencia of Santo Domingo, for litigants who were ordinary citizens, or to the governor of Cuba for those who held special privileges (fueros), such as members of the military or clergy. 5 An escribano (clerk or scribe) recorded all court proceedings. Most of the cases the governor and alcaldes heard make up a collection known as the "Spanish Judicial Records," which along with the "French Judicial Records" (those of the French Superior Council), are housed at the Louisiana State Museum Historical Center in New Orleans.6 . The case of "Criminal Proceedings Pursued by don Pedro Favrot against Maria Cofignie, Free Parda, Concerning Slander,"7 most of which is translated in the following pages,8 came before the governor general, Francisco Luis Hector, el Baron de Carondelet, in June 1795. The governor usually adjudicated criminal cases, especially those in which one of the parties was favored with the fuero military (judicial privileges granted to military personnel); the plaintiff Favrot was a captain in the fixed or permanent infantry regiment of Louisiana. When Cofignie allegedly insulted and harangued his daughter and indirectly his wife, Favrot petitioned the governor's court for redress. His original petition was written in French, the language of most New Orleanians, and translated into Spanish by Public Interpreter don Juan Josef Duforest. Favrot presented the testimony of two witnesses, and based on this evidence Carondelet placed Cofignie under house arrest because there was no women's prison at the time. Cofignie in turn provided her version of the events and played on the sympathies of the court as a poor single working mother with several children to support. Eventually Favrot settled for an apology to his wife and daughter, which Cofignie reluctantly made. The Spanish judicial system thus successfully mediated between competing interests to reach an acceptable compromise, while taking into account the race, status, and gender of each party. As in the Favrot-Cofignie case, the courts typically encouraged plaintiffs and defendants to reconcile their differences and admonished them to act according to acceptable rules of conduct. Cofignie, however, did not give up fighting for what she believed to be just causes. The same month that Favrot brought charges against her, she petitioned a tribunal for the freedom of her brother, Antonio Cofignie. Antonio was a slave of Maria's former mistress, the widow of Maria and Antonio's white father, don Claudio Cofignie. It appears that don Claudio had verbally promised to give each of his three illegitimate children (Maria, Feliciana, and Antonio), born to his slave Luison, 400 pesos to purchase their freedom. The girls had done so before don Claudio Cofignie's death in 1786, but Antonio had not, and now the widow refused to free him for that amount, demanding instead what Maria claimed to be an exorbitant sum. While Maria was in the process of seeking retribution, Antonio took matters into his own hands and ran away. His mistress then accused Maria of assisting Antonio and hiding him; ironically, Maria, who obviously placed much faith in the legal system, was thrown in jail once more, where she again called on the mercy of the court as a pobre mujer to release her so that she could support her family. Finally, a white planter in Opelousas, Louisiana, whose ties to the Cofignies are not clear, paid 1,100 pesos for the fugitive, with the promise that Maria would reimburse him that sum if her brother ever reappeared.9 As a single mother, Maria also struggled to care for her children. During the era of Spanish rule in New Orleans, Cofignie bore eight babies, the first in 1785 and the last in 1801; of these, three died in their youth. She had another daughter in 1806. The father of only one of Cofignie’s children was identified in existing documents. Her son Josef Urra, a cuarterón libre born November 1797, was described in his baptismal record as the illegitimate son of Manuel Urra and the parda libre Maria Cofignie.10 Although Cofignie repeatedly appealed for mercy based on the fact that she had to work to support these numerous children, court records and censuses do not indicate her occupation. The most common jobs for free black women in New Orleans in the 1790s were laundress, seamstress, and seller; Cofignie most likely earned her living in one of these ways. Many of those individuals who tested the boundaries of elite-defined acceptable behavior were free blacks like Maria Cofignie. Their position within New Orleans's hierarchy was not well defined, and, in fact, most libres did not choose to be demarcated as a separate group, preferring instead to be admitted to, and accepted by, white society. Although radicalized by the possibilities for equality with whites seemingly offered in the philosophies of the French and Haitian Revolutions, free blacks in New Orleans generally wanted to reform, not overthrow, the hierarchical Spanish social system that condemned them outright for being nonwhites and that failed to recognize their worth except as measured by skin color. Their challenges escalated in the revolutionary decades of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.11 The case that follows reveals many of these tensions. In their recorded statements, the litigants raise the issue of racial discrimination and comment, often implicitly, on distinct notions of personal honor, patriarchy, family, gender roles, and the meaning of freedom. Like all libres living in slave societies, New Orleans free women of color operated from an undefined, anomalous position, the middle section of a three-tiered hierarchy in which they were not truly free or slave, often not pure black or white. Libre women were also trapped in a patriarchal so that valued males more than females but that did not afford them the paternal protection due the weaker sex because ostensibly they did not possess honor and virtue, attributes only accorded whites. But as we will see in the following testimony, Maria Cofignie and other libre women did not suffer in silence. This source is a part of the Gender and Race in Colonial Latin America teaching module.

Short Teaching Module: Gender and Race in Colonial Latin America

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Gender and Race in Colonial Latin America: “‘The Most Vile Atrocities’: Accusations of Slander Against María Cofignie, Parda Libre (Louisiana, 1795)”

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Scandal at the Church: José de Alfaro Accuses Doña Theresa Bravo and Others of Insulting and Beating His Castiza Wife, Joséfa Cadena (Mexico, 1782)

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Gender and Race in Colonial Latin America: “Don Manuel Valdivieso y Carrión Protests the marriage of His Daughter to Don Teodoro Jaramillo, a Person of Lower Social Standing (Quito, 1784-85)”

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Gender and Race in Colonial Latin America: “‘The Most Vile Atrocities’: Accusations of Slander Against María Cofignie, Parda Libre (Louisiana, 1795)”

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Scandal at the Church: José de Alfaro Accuses Doña Theresa Bravo and Others of Insulting and Beating His Castiza Wife, Joséfa Cadena (Mexico, 1782)

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Gender and Race in Colonial Latin America: “Don Manuel Valdivieso y Carrión Protests the marriage of His Daughter to Don Teodoro Jaramillo, a Person of Lower Social Standing (Quito, 1784-85)”

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Gender and Race in Colonial Latin America: “‘The Most Vile Atrocities’: Accusations of Slander Against María Cofignie, Parda Libre (Louisiana, 1795)”

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