Lesson 19
Question SA-10. Here is the text reference (p. 184/3 & 4):
"Gamonalism" inevitably invalidates every law and ordinance
set up to protect the Indigenous peoples. The landowner, the latifundist,
is a feudal lord. Against his authority, aided by the environment and habit,
the written law is impotent. Free labor is prohibited by law, and yet, free
labor, and even forced labor, survive in the latifundium. The judge, the
subprefect, the constable, the teacher, the tax collector, are vassals to
the feudalism of large landownership. The law cannot prevail against the
gamonales. The official who insists on imposing the law, will be abandoned
and sacrificed by the central power structure, around which the influences
of gamonalismo are always omnipotent, whether they act directly, or through
the parliament, and are equally efficient whichever path they take. ...
The oldest and most evident defeat is, without a doubt, that which reduces
the protection of the Indigenous peoples to a matter of ordinary administration.
From the days of Spanish colonial legislation, the wise and tidy ordinances,
drafted after conscientious surveys, show themselves to be totally fruitless.
The prolific output of the Republic, from the days of Independence, in matters
of decrees, laws, and other measures seeking to protect the Indians against
exploitation and abuse, is at least large and considerable. But today's
gamonal, just the like "encomendero" of yesterday, has nevertheless
very little to fear from administrative theory. He knows that things are
different in practice.