118 Law and Morality Abroad (to ca. ad 1550)this argument found a number of ready supporters, even though it was con-
trary to natural- law doctrine, which allowed slavery only as a punishment
for crime. (Th e ius gentium allowed it, in addition, for prisoners of war.) As
early as 1503, at the very fi rst of the Spanish government- organized juntas,
the applicability of this thesis to the Americas was debated. Participating in
the discussion were theologians and canon lawyers, as well as royal council-
lors. Th eir conclusion was that, according to human and divine law, the In-
dians should serve the Spaniards.
Th e most prominent intellectual champion of this theory was a Scottish
writer named John Mair (or Major). Mair was based chiefl y in Paris, where
he moved in the humanist circles of Erasmus and Rabelais and became a
teacher of theology. He later returned to Scotland to serve as principal of the
University of Glasgow, also writing a history of Britain and then serving as
provost of St. Salvator’s College in the University of St. Andrews. In 1519,
during his time in Paris, he wrote a work on the Sentences of Peter Lombard
(the prominent twelft h- century theologian), which contained what has been
called “the fi rst extended theoretical treatment of Spain’s actions in Amer-
ica.” In his exposition, Mair expressly invoked the views of Aristotle con-
cerning the natural fi tness of certain persons for servitude. Th e peoples of
the New World, he confi dently asserted (without having traveled there or
met any of them), “live like beasts, wherefore the fi rst person to conquer
them, justly rules over them because they are by nature slaves.” In 1521, a
government- organized junta supported Mair’s position for the enslavement
of the New World Indians.
Th ere were, however, many misgivings about enslavement of the Indians.
Palacios Rubios (the legal mastermind behind the requerimiento), for exam-
ple, agreed with Aristotle and Mair that the Indians were incapable of self-
government. But he also insisted that the Indians could not be enslaved if
they dutifully accepted their status as Spanish subjects.
Th e fatal blow to the natural- slavery thesis was delivered by the Vatican.
In 1537, Pope Paul III issued a bull entitled Sublimis Deus (“Th e Sublime
God”). It expressly rejected the contention that Indians should be treated as
“dumb brutes created for our ser vice,” denouncing that proposition as a ca-
nard put about by Satan. Th e true position, the pope declared, is that “the
Indians are truly men and that they are not only capable of understanding
the Catholic faith but, according to our information, they desire exceedingly