Anita Arnon

tough for them, they just have to bolster what we are doing and where we are.

So the reforms are quite convoluted, but let me just boil it down to something very, very simple.

They are basically creating conditions for a growing politicization of the colonies because what they're going to do is going to really annoy people.

Creoles who were in administrative roles, who were, you know, sort of doing some very senior jobs.

Yeah.

Okay.

So they were high level, but they weren't ever viceroys.

Everyone who's doing any work is going to be a Creole.

Got it.

Okay.

But suddenly, this Bourbon reform says, you know what, actually, that leaves us a little bit vulnerable.

We are only going to put peninsulares, these officials born on the Spanish mainland, in those jobs because these Creoles are kind of getting a little bit big for their boots.

Uppity.

Exactly.

Uppity to use that horrific thing.

And also, you know, they start getting a little bit suspicious of the Catholic Church as well, because the Catholic Church, you know, their constituencies in the colonies are the colonists, right?

So they start thinking, actually, you know, they're going slightly off book as well.

Not all of them.

I mean...

By and large, you know, the church is very loyal to Spain, but there are these sort of renegades who are starting to think of themselves as an entity rather than, you know, sort of a Spanish loyalist.