Alonso de Zuazo
Alonso de Zuazo (also spelled Suazo) (1466 – March 1539) was a Spanish lawyer and colonial judge and governor in New Spain and in Santo Domingo. He served in New Spain during the period of Hernán Cortés's government and before the appointment of the first viceroy. He was a member of all of the various triumvirates that governed the colony between October 12, 1524 and May 23, 1525, in the absence of Cortés.
He was a native of Segovia, Spain (according to Bartolomé de Las Casas) or of Olmedo, Spain (according to Francisco Calcagno). He graduated from the University of Salamanca, where he was said to have studied twenty years.
He first arrived in Santo Domingo in 1517, sent there by Cardinal Jiménez de Cisneros to assist the friars of the Order of Jerome in the resolution of political problems in the Indies.
In Santo Domingo, Zuazo wrote to Spanish King Charles I (Holy Roman Emperor Charles V) and William de Croÿ, Charles's chamberlain, to inform them of the hidden costs of slavery in the New World (January 22, 1518). At the same time, he recommended the importation of black slaves, even specifying the age at which they should be imported (15 to 20 years), and that they should marry. They were to replace Indigenous slaves, and he anticipated that they would bring in much gold.[1]
From Santo Domingo, Diego Columbus sent Zuazo to Cuba, as a juez de residencia (judge in a grievance case) in the case of Diego Velázquez de Cuéllar, governor of Cuba (1521–22).
When Charles V granted Hernán Cortés the titles of governor and captain general of New Spain in 1522, he also appointed five officials to oversee Cortés's government. These were Alonso de Estrada as treasurer; Gonzalo de Salazar as factor or tax collector, Rodrigo de Albornoz as auditor, Pedro Almíndez Chirino as inspector, and Lic. Zuazo as justicia mayor or assessor. They arrived in New Spain in 1524 and formed the Tribunal de Cuentas (tribunal of accounts). This was the first office of public finance established in New Spain.
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