Procuradores of New Spain 
125 
[Memorial of the Procuradores of New Spain to the King. Undated .] 
Sacred Catholic Imperial Majesty: The procuradores [attorneys] of 
New Spain petition and supplicate your Majesty to grant to this land—so 
that there may be planted and perpetuated in it our holy Catholic faith 
and new church, the service of your Majesty, the royal patrimony and 
revenues, and the peace and advancement of the native Indians and 
Spaniards who live and are to take root in it—the following measures: 
First, that your Majesty grant the favor to that land as soon as possi¬ 
ble of ordering that there shall be no corregimientos in it, and that in all 
the Indian towns, those which are vassal to the Spaniards, as well as those 
which are under the authority of your Majesty, except some principal 
towns of all those remaining, this shall be done: perpetual partition among 
the ever faithful vassals of your Majesty, the Spaniards who won and 
conquered it at their own expense and with their blood and labors, and 
the settlers who have settled it, as it may please your Majesty among them, 
always taking care that the conquerors be preferred and the character 
and services of the persons [be considered]. 
The other is, that inasmuch as your Majesty has in New Spain and in 
these, your kingdoms, persons of great credit, knowledge, honesty, and 
fidelity—cavaliers, prelates, and religious—that you be pleased at once to 
charge and appoint persons to make the said perpetual partition, and to 
give them the necessary commission so that it may be done with all 
promptitude; and so much the better if the persons who are to do it shall 
be of the City of Mexico and not of these kingdoms, for, with the body of 
persons and services present it is easy to hit the mark, while to do it 
here, without seeing, would surely cause it to be missed. 
And may your Majesty be pleased likewise to order without delay that 
the articles of the laws which your Majesty sent to that land be amended, 
suspended, and revoked—as New Spain has supplicated, as will appear in 
the autos and proof made before your royal audiencia and presented by the 
attorneys and now in the possession of the secretary—by commanding 
that they be not followed, for their gravity and rigor have caused great 
injury to the land and its inhabitants, and will cause even greater if they 
continue. To do this in the interval while the said perpetual partition is 
being made and finished is what is most advantageous to the royal service 
of your Majesty. 
And, since the evident reasons by which this that the New World asks, 
claims, and supplicates, clearly appears and seems to be just, and entirely 
in the service of God, our Lord, and your Majesty, and the increase of the 
royal patrimony and the solidity and perpetuity of that land, are stated in 
the petition of the said procuradores which antedated this memorial and 
are proved by the said evidence and autos, they ask and beg that all be 
read. 
Gonzalo López. 1 — Alonso de Villanueva. — [Signed with rubrics.] 
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