You could own and trade slaves, you could just not enslave them, since by implication it covered all folk with natural rights. Africans did the enslaving. Besides, tropical Africa was so pathogenically dangerous for Europeans, if a European went inland they have a life expectancy of about a year.
You could own and trade slaves, you could just not enslave them, since by implication it covered all folk with natural rights. Africans did the enslaving. Besides, tropical Africa was so pathogenically dangerous for Europeans, if a European went inland they have a life expectancy of about a year.
iirc, Fr. Bartolome de las Casas' core argument was pretty simple: there was no previous church doctrine supporting the idea that non-Christians were sub-human and incapable of salvation.
You could own and trade slaves, you could just not enslave them, since by implication it covered all folk with natural rights. Africans did the enslaving. Besides, tropical Africa was so pathogenically dangerous for Europeans, if a European went inland they have a life expectancy of about a year.
That's some fairly fine hair-splitting - but considering the source is a papal bull, perhaps that is appropriate.
iirc, Fr. Bartolome de las Casas' core argument was pretty simple: there was no previous church doctrine supporting the idea that non-Christians were sub-human and incapable of salvation.
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Bartolome-de-Las-Casas/Adviser-to-Charles-V
de las Casas apparently studied this when developing his stance against the enslavement/destruction of indigenous tribes:
https://www.britannica.com/topic/Ecclesiasticus