Gente de razón

Gente de razón (Spanish pronunciation: [ˈxente ðe raˈθon], "people of reason" or "rational people") is a Spanish term used in colonial Spanish America and modern Hispanic America to refer to people who were culturally Hispanicized. It was a social distinction that existed alongside the racial categories of the sistema de castas. Indigenous peoples (indios or "Indians"), who maintained their culture and lived in their legally recognized communities (the repúblicas de indios), and mixed-race people (the castas), especially the poor in urban centers, were generally considered not to be gente de razón.

The term is ultimately derived from Aristotelian and Roman legal ideas about the use of reason in persons and the status of minority before the law. Under Roman law many adults (women, grown men who were not heads of household) were deemed legal minors under the protection of a tutor (usually the pater familias).

Since the sixteenth century the Laws of the Indies categorized Indians as minors under the protection of the Crown (cf. Dhimmi status in the Ottoman legal system). Slaves, and by extension all Blacks, were also legally deemed not to belong to the gente de razón. These groups were also excluded from the priesthood for most of the colonial period.

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