ABSTRACT
The Council of the Indies, chartered in 1524, stood at the head of the Spanish imperial administration almost to the close of the colonial period. The controlling influence of the Catholic church in the social and spiritual life of the colonies was deeply rooted in the Spanish past. Royal control over ecclesiastical affairs, in both Spain and the Indies, was founded on the institution of the patronato real. Beginning with Columbus’s second voyage, one or more clergymen accompanied every expedition that sailed for the Indies. They converted prodigious numbers of natives, and some championed the rights of the Indians against their Spanish oppressors. The shifting pattern of Spain’s administration of the Indies in the sixteenth century reflected the steady growth of centralited rule in Spain itself and the application of a trial-and-error method to the problems of colonial government.
