UNIVERSITY of CALIFORNIA Los Angeles Padres Descontentos
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UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA Los Angeles Padres Descontentos: Spanish Imperial Policy, Franciscan Decline, and the California Mission System, 1784-1803 A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy in History by Jeremiah John Sladeck 2020 © Copyright by Jeremiah John Sladeck 2020 ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION Padres Descontentos: Spanish Imperial Policy, Franciscan Decline, and the California Mission System, 1784-1805 by Jeremiah John Sladeck Doctor of Philosophy in History University of California, Los Angeles, 2020 Professor Stephen Aron, Chair So long has the shadow cast by Junípero Serra been that it has obscured the history of the California mission system as it developed after the founding father’s death in 1784. In both the scholarly and popular imagination, Father Serra has become the lasting symbol of the California missions. He acts as an escutcheon, shielding the eras that followed from careful scrutiny. The intense scholarly focus on Serra leaves the impression that he either led the Franciscans throughout their time in California or that nothing significant occurred after his passing. Shining a light on Serra’s shadow, my dissertation explores the world of California missions and missionaries, their Indian converts, and their secular rivals in the twenty years following Serra’s death. It exposes the chaos, conflicts, and cover-ups that characterized the California missions in the period from 1784 to 1805, the years in which the mantle of leadership was taken up by Fermín Francisco de Lasuén. Focusing on this era broadens our understanding ii of the California mission system in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and the nature of Spanish colonialism. Another gap in scholarly understanding is the role imperial politics played shaping the missions. Too often, California is studied in isolation, treated as if it was the island it was presumed to be on early maps. Its connections to Spanish America and to Spain get lost. Yet anti-clerical policy enacted by the Spanish crown in the mid-eighteenth century had a profound impact on California, sending the Franciscans into a period of decline in both zeal and competency just as they became the vanguard of the California colonial project. Lasuén and his priests trained during that period and developed a different posture towards missionary life and the Indians they baptized. Gone was the desire to martyr themselves for the spiritual uplift of neophytes that marked Serra’s group, replaced by a deep cynicism born of their order’s decline. The order’s problems with Indigenous Californians under Serra metastasized during Lasuén’s presidency, as the missions became marked by disease, violence, and forced recruitment. After Lasuén’s death in 1803, his administration’s cynicism became the prevalent attitude of Franciscan leadership and much of the rank-and-file priests that followed, spurring increasing Indigenous resistance in the nineteenth century. iii The dissertation of Jeremiah John Sladeck is approved. Benjamin Madley Sanjay Subrahmanyam Marissa López Stephen Aron, Committee Chair University of California, Los Angeles 2020 iv For Jacquelyn Sladeck, and the pep talk you gave me at Picca, this was not possible without you v TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgements ........................................................................................................................vii Vita ................................................................................................................................................. xi Introduction ......................................................................................................................................1 Chapter 1: Spanish Insecurities in Indigenous California, 1784 - 1786 ........................................21 Chapter 2: Maintaining the Good Name of the Missionaries, 1786 - 1790 ...................................64 Chapter 3: Rubi, Gilí, and the Padres Descontentos Come to California, 1790 - 1794 ...............108 Chapter 4: The Crisis at Mission San Francisco, 1794 – 1797 ....................................................146 Chapter 5: Refutation of Charges, 1797 - 1803 ...........................................................................193 Conclusion ...................................................................................................................................251 Bibliography ................................................................................................................................266 vi Acknowledgements Nearly all acknowledgement pages begin with the declaration that the author never intended to write a book on the chosen topic. This is especially true in my case. When I went back to school in 2005, attending City College of San Francisco as a thirty-year-old, my intention was simply to earn a bachelor’s degree in History. After transferring to California State University, Northridge, I realized graduate school might be in my future. I envisioned myself becoming a Cold War scholar, focusing on Vietnam, or perhaps United States-Latin American relations. Then I read the journalist Carey McWilliams’ seminal text, Southern California: An Island on the Land and pivoted to California history. My chosen topic as a master’s student at CSUN was the vigilantism that plagued gold-rush era Los Angeles. While applying to doctoral programs, I learned that the Yale scholar John Mack Faragher’s next book, which eventually became Eternity Street: Violence and Justice in Frontier Los Angeles, overlapped with my topic. I found myself in an unenviable position. The University of California, Los Angeles accepted my application, and Stephen Aron graciously agreed to be my advisor, yet I was a graduate student with no subject for my hypothetical dissertation. In my second quarter, Benjamin Madley suggested that I investigate the California mission system, and, as they say, the rest is history. The seven years I spent at UCLA were among the most intellectually rigorous, humbling, and rewarding of my life. This project owes its existence to Stephen Aron’s patience, insights, and preternatural gift for asking questions. I am forever grateful for his guidance and wisdom. I can never thank Benjamin Madley enough for his support and belief in my abilities as a historian, especially as my own waxed and waned. There are a host of other committee members, professors, History Department staff, and fellow graduate students that assisted me, supported vii me, inspired me, and generally put up with me, which is not always easy. I cannot imagine my journey without Sanjay Subramanyam, Marissa López, Mary Corey, Robin Kelley, Carla Pestana, Toby Higbie, Vinay Lal, Teofilo Ruiz, Matthew Fisher, Scot Brown, Hadley D. Porter, Sarah Johnson, Iris Clever, Preston McBride, Elle Harvell, Peter Chesney, Rhiannon Koehler, Ryan Hilliard, Nicole Gilhaus, Sohaib Baig, Michael O’Sullivan, Dan Lynch, Max Flomen, Sa Whitley, Marissa A. Jenrich, and Marques Vestal. Thank you all. A special thanks goes to the Friends of the UCLA History Department and their gracious funding of my final year. Their financial assistance provided much needed peace of mind and the space to finish this dissertation on my terms. My four years at CSUN changed the trajectory of my life and my future as a historian. The historians I met there believed in me and worked to prepare me to apply to Ph.D. programs and for success when I was eventually accepted. I am honored that Thomas W. Devine, Miriam Neirick, Merry Ovnick, and Josh Sides wrote letters for my applications. I still feel like they were the reason UCLA accepted me. I will always fondly remember the nurturing community of scholars and students who came through my life while at CSUN. Thank you, Joyce Broussard, Clementine Oliver, Susan Fitzpatrick Behrens, Thomas Maddux, Nan Yamane, Christopher Magra, Donal O’Sullivan, John Paul Nuño, Michael Ward, Richard S. Horowitz, Jefferey D. Kaja, Natale A. Zappia, Andrea Headley, Armig Manoukian, Maite Peterson, Jorge N. Leal, and Matthew Lucas. This journey began fourteen years ago on the foggy and windswept campus of CCSF. It was there, in my second semester, that Paolo Sapienza suggested that I would one day defend a dissertation. I thought he must have hit his head that morning. I am not sure if I can ever communicate how much those words meant to me. Without the support of Mitra Sapienza, viii Cynthia Slates, Alisa Messer, Hal Huntsman, Darrel Hess, Richard Oxen, Mary J Adams, Tarik Farrar, Edward Moreno, Richard Compean, Alexandria R. Leyton, Guillermo Turcios, and Martino Poggio, I am not sure that I would have found the strength to successfully transfer to a university. I researched the bulk of this dissertation at the Bancroft Library, on the campus of the University of California, Berkeley. Some of my happiest and most anxious times during this journey were spent quietly searching through manuscripts and microfiche in the Heller Reading Room. I hope to be back sometime soon. This project was the beneficiary of the helpfulness and expertise of the Bancroft’s archivists, librarians, and student workers. I would like to especially thank Theresa Salazar for taking the time to answer a frantic graduate student’s emails. I also spent time researching at the Santa Bárbara Mission Archive Library, in Santa Barbara, California. SBMAL is a comforting, intimate setting with an astonishing California History library. Everyone at the archive was welcoming and helpful,