change inevitable. The spirit of Mexican republicanism was not favorable to the longer existence of the old missions under a system of land monopoly strongly tinged with some phases of human slavery. If the Indians were not fit for citizenship, neither were they being fitted therefor.
Echeandía and the administration that appointed him desired to secularize the missions, but understood that it was a problem requiring careful study. Neither party was disposed to act hastily in the matter: the Mexican authorities largely perhaps because of indifference to the interests of a territory so far away; and the governor by reason not only of his natural tendency to inaction, but of the difficulties with which on arrival he found himself surrounded. These difficulties, as the reader has learned, were insurmountable. Had the territorial finances been in a sound condition, had the military force been thoroughly organized and promptly paid, had there been fifty curates at hand to take charge of new parishes, had the territory been to some extent independent of the missions — even with these favorable conditions, none of which existed, secularization would have been a difficult task if not a risky experiment, requiring for success at least the hearty coöperation of the friars. Under existing circumstances, however, which need not be recapitulated here, against the will of the padres, who, with their influence over the neophytes and their threats to retire en masse, were largely masters of the situation, any radical change in the mission status would bring ruin to the territory.
The governor recognized the impossibility of immediate action; but in accordance with the policy of his government,[1] with his own republican theories, with
- ↑ Jan. 31, 1825, min. of war to gov. A statement of grievances suffered by the Indians of Cal. States that it is the president's desire to do away with so vicious a system, but suggests that the reform should perhaps be one of policy rather than of authority. It is not expedient to break up openly the system of the padres, who if offended might by their influence cause great evils. Still it was essential to check the arbitrary measures that oppressed the Indians, and afford the latter the advantages of the liberal system — but
