Reconquista (Spanish America)

In colonial Spanish America, the Reconquista refers to the period following the defeat of Napoleon in 1814 during which royalist armies were able to gain the upper hand in the Spanish American wars of independence. The term makes an analogy to the medieval Reconquista, in which Christian forces retook the Iberian Peninsula.

During Napoleon's invasion of the Iberian peninsula, a number of Spanish colonies in the Americas moved for greater autonomy or outright independence due to the political instability in Spain. By 1815 the general outlines of which areas were controlled by royalists and pro-independence forces had been established and a general stalemate set in the war. With the exception of rural areas controlled by guerrillas, North America was under the control of royalists, and in South America only the Southern Cone and New Granada remained outside of royalist control. After French forces left Spain in 1814, the restored Spanish king, Ferdinand VII, declared the developments in the Americas illegal and sent armies to quell the areas still in rebellion. The impact of these expeditions were most notably felt in Chile, New Granada, and Venezuela. The restoration was short lived, reversed by 1820 in these three countries.

The restoration of Ferdinand VII signified an important change, since most of the political and legal changes done on both sides of the Atlantic—the myriad of juntas, the Cortes in Spain and several of the congresses in the Americas, and many of the constitutions and new legal codes—had been done in his name. Once in Spain he realized that he had significant support from conservatives in the general population and the hierarchy of the Spanish Catholic Church, and so on May 4, he repudiated the Spanish Constitution of 1812 and ordered the arrest of liberal leaders who had created it on May 10. Ferdinand justified his actions by stating that the Constitution and other changes had been made by a Cortes assembled in his absence and without his consent. He also declared all of the juntas and constitutions written in Spanish America invalid and restored the former law codes and political institutions. News of the events arrived through Spanish America during the next three weeks to nine months, depending on time it took goods and people to travel from Spain.

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