Las Casas studied canon law and eventually earned two degrees. He excelled in his studies, particularly Latin, and his strong academic background served him well in the years to come.
In , Las Casas finally went to see the family holdings in Hispaniola. By then, the Indigenous peoples of the island had been mostly subdued, and the city of Santo Domingo was being used as a resupply point for Spanish incursions in the Caribbean.
The young man accompanied the governor on two different military missions aimed at pacifying Indigenous people who remained on the island. On one of these trips, Las Casas witnessed a massacre of poorly armed Indigenous people, a scene he would never forget.
He traveled around the island a great deal and was able to see the deplorable conditions in which the Indigenous people lived. Over the next few years, Las Casas traveled to Spain and back several times, finishing his studies and learning more about the sad situation of the Indigenous peoples.
By , he decided that he could no longer be personally involved in their exploitation and renounced his family holdings in Hispaniola. He became convinced that the enslavement and slaughter of the Indigenous population was not only a crime but also a mortal sin as defined by the Catholic Church. It was this ironclad conviction that would eventually make him such a staunch advocate for fair treatment of Indigenous peoples.
Las Casas convinced Spanish authorities to allow him to try to save the few remaining Caribbean Indigenous people by freeing them from enslavement and placing them in free towns, but the death of Spain's King Ferdinand in and the resulting chaos over his successor caused these reforms to be delayed. Las Casas also asked for and received a section of the Venezuelan mainland for an experiment. He believed he could pacify Indigenous people with religion rather than weapons.
Unfortunately, the region that was selected had been heavily raided by enslavers, and the Indigenous peoples' hostility toward the Europeans was too intense to overcome.
With letters from the Flemish Franciscans in Hispaniola, Las Casas won speedy approval from Charles for another of his early schemes, colonization by farmers instead of soldiers.
This colony would have a minimum of force and a maximum of persuasion to allow the Spaniards to live in fruitful peace with the Indians.
The project failed because of the greed for slaving in the party assembled. Las Casas saw he had compromised his duty to be protector of the Indians.
In the depths of discouragement, he left his work and entered the Dominican Order on the Island of Hispaniola in at the age of Scholars call his entrance into the Dominican Order the second conversion of Las Casas. He spent his initial years studying theology and law, after which he was appointed prior of an out-post on the north coast of Dominican Republic, Puerto de Plata, where he founded a new community. About the year he began writing a Latin treatise, De Unico Vocationis Modo Omnium Gentium ad Veram Religionem , which became one of the most significant missionary tracts in the history of the Church.
Basically, it was a blueprint for his own later missionary experiments: the spread of the Gospel by peaceful means alone, the need for understanding of doctrine and clear catechesis prior to conversion, the need to respect and utilize native cultures as part of the missionary enterprise.
Out of these innovative ideas came the landmark papal bull, Sublimis Deus , often called the Magna Carta of Indians rights. This promulgation of proclaimed that the Indians were truly human and capable of receiving the faith and that they were not to be deprived of their liberty or property, even though they may be outside of the faith. This document proved a powerful weapon in the hands of the pro-Indian forces, although it was never formally published in the Spanish dominions.
Las Casas promptly renamed the area tierra de vera paz. This missionary effort proved very successful and is a model of his evangelization ideas in practice.
In Las Casas returned to Spain and joined other churchmen and laymen to lobby Charles V for protection for the Amerindians. His nearly forty years of experience in the Americas made him an informative and convincing source for the king to trust. As a result of this lobbying effort, the New Laws of were enacted, a striking combination of political reality and humanitarian idealism, that abolished slavery and the encomienda system.
This effort ranked as the supreme achievement of his career. His friends impressed on him that, by accepting the miter, he would automatically be free from the vow of obedience and could use the ecclesiastical arm to enforce the New Laws. His action aroused much enmity against him, but he was indifferent: the text of the New Laws was explicit, leaving no opening for false implementation.
Las Casas was back in the New World in , this time as bishop of Chiapa and with the largest missionary contingent ever assembled: forty-five Dominican friars, and a lay staff of five. There he convinced secular authorities to respect ecclesiastical immunity and along with support from church officials produced a series of strong pro-Indian statements. He even persuaded the Viceroy to convoke a separate meeting of friars who denounced Indian slavery.
Armed with these forceful resolutions, Bishop Las Casas prepared for his final return trip to Spain. He appointed a Vicar General for his diocese with a select group of friars to hear confessions according to the twelve rules that he sent under strictest secrecy in his Avisos y Reglas Para Confesores. The confessor was to deny absolution to anyone who profited from Indian life and land.
Moreover, since these rules asserted the illegality of the encomienda system and the conquest — a defiance of royal authority, because it was the king who had granted them -- he was questioning royal authority. Apparently he did not graduate from a university, although he studied Latin and the humanities in Seville.
The facts of his life after are well known. In the West Indies he participated in Indian wars, acquired land and slaves, and felt no serious qualms about his actions, although he had been ordained a priest. Not until his fortieth year did Las Casas experience a moral conversion, perhaps the awakening of a dormant sensitivity as a result of the horrors he saw about him.
Castellnas laws had declared the free Crown subjects Indians, although subject to guardianship, by what they had right to their personal freedom and the possession of their property. On the other hand, it is only admitted that they work for the conquerors voluntarily, in Exchange for a wage and spiritual care.
This situation was not accepted by the Trustees, so the gap between law and practice would mark the conquest and colonization of the new world. See Encomienda. Houses are separated from it soon, disgusted by the torment of Hatuey Indians and the killing of Caonao.
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