Short Account of the Destruction of
the Indies by Bartolome de Las
Casas
An Important And Terrifying Work
In 1542, after years of witnessing Indian suffering and slavery, Bartolome
de Las Casas wrote this indictment against European exploitation and
mistreatment of the native peoples of the New World. The document was
dedicated to Prince Philip of Spain and appeared in published form in
1552. It carries all the urgency of a moment in history when it still seemed
possible to reverse the tide.
Personal Review: Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies
by Bartolome de Las Casas
"A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies" is a powerful written
protest against the Spanish treatment of the American Indians. Bartolome
de las Casas, a Dominican friar, witnessed first-hand the colonization of
the Americas by the Spaniards, and felt it his duty to document the
atrocities. He dedicated "short account" to King Philip II, in the hope that

once he was aware of the atrocities, he would put a stop to them, as any
good kings would. Casas documents the "destruction of the indies" in what
is today Haiti and the Domican Republic, Mexico, Colombia, Venezuela,
and Peru. Among other things, Casas reports that the Spaniards, upon
coming to the Indian villages, either tortured and killed them for the gold
that they might be hiding, or forced them into slavery in gold mines. The
"blackguards," as he calls them, would even kill pregnant women, the
elderly, and children by either burning them alive, running them through
with lances, or setting vicious dogs on them. Supposedly, the Indians
welcomed the Spaniards and offered to serve them, and were rewarded
with torture, murder, and slavery. Casas' account has a sense of urgency
that things matters might still be reversed. Further, "Short Account" is
arguably the first human rights report.
That's not to say that Casas was perfect, at least by modern standards. In
his view, one of the worst aspects of the wholesale slaughter of the Indians
was that they would go straight to Hell, since they never heard the gospel
or received the sacraments. Moreover, he never questioned the right of the
Spanish to be there, or of Pope Alexander VI to grant sovereignty of the
Americas to Spain and Portugal. So the fact that the book became central
to the "black legend" was in spite of Casas' beliefs, not because of them. In
fact, at one point he refers to Protestant German merchants who go to the
Americas as heretics, so he certainly never would have countenanced
Protestant Anglo-Dutch propaganda against Spain. Nor is it his intent to
portray Spaniards as uniquely cruel, as black legend propaganda did;
Casas simply saw the Conquistadors who killed and enslaved the Indians,
rather than converting them, as sinners. Finally, as other reviewers have
noted, Casas advocated replacing Indian slaves with black slaves. He
eventually realized his mistake, but it was too late. In addition, Casas
definitely takes the "noble savage" angle in portraying the Indians, which is
now discredited.
Of course, not everything in it can be taken as literally true. For instance,
Casas claims that in Mexico City, the conquistadors herded the natives
into a temple and burned it. That would have been difficult, since the
temple was made of stone and so could not have been set on fire. In
addition, the number of dead he gives- 15 million- is impossible to verify.
We don't know the pre-conquest population of the Americas with certainty,
nor the number dead as a result of Spanish atrocities. But in that the
Spaniards killed and plundered is not disputable, so Casas' account is
more right than it is wrong.
Whatever Casas' flaws were, however, he was the only one in Catholic
Spain to raise a loud protest against the treatment of the Indians. He stood
above the men of his time, and contributed, willingly or not, to modern
ideas such as liberation theology and human rights theory. Interestingly, he
was one of the first to explicitly say that political power comes from the
consent of the governed, and that those who are oppressed by some
foreign monarch claiming jurisdiction over them have every right to rebel.

So in conclusion, this is a must read for those wishing to learn about
renaissance, early American, ecclesiastical, and political history. It should
be required reading in schools.
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