African Immigration To Puerto Rico - Royal Decree of Graces of 1789

Royal Decree of Graces of 1789

After 1784, the method of hot branding the slaves forehead was suspended and they were permitted to obtain their freedom under the following circumstances:

• A slave could be freed in a church or outside of it, before a judge, by testament or letter in the presence of his master.
• A slave could be freed against his master's will by denouncing a forced rape, by denouncing a counterfeiter, by discovering disloyalty against the king, and by denouncing murder against his master.
• Any slave who received part of his master's estate in his master's will automatically became free.
• If a slave were left as guardian to his master's children he also became free.
• If slave parents in Hispanic America had ten children, the whole family went free.

In 1789, the Spanish Crown issued the "Royal Decree of Graces of 1789", which set new rules pertaining to the commercialization of slaves and added restrictions to the granting of freeman status. The decree granted its subjects the right to purchase slaves and to participate in the flourishing business of slave trading in the Caribbean. Later that year a new slave code, also known as "El Código Negro" (The Black code), was introduced.

In accordance to "El Código Negro" the slave could buy his freedom, in the event that his master was willing to sell, by paying the price sought. Slaves were allowed to earn money during their spare time by working as shoemakers, by cleaning clothes, or by selling the produce they were allowed to grow in the small patch of land given to them by their masters. Slaves were able to pay for their freedom by installments. They could make payments in installments for a new born child, not yet baptized, at a cost of half the going price for a baptized child. Many of these freeman started settlements in the areas which became known as Cangrejos (Santurce), Carolina, Canóvanas, Loíza, and Luquillo and some became slave owners themselves. The native-born Puerto Ricans (criollos) who wanted to serve in the regular Spanish army petitioned the Spanish Crown to this effect. In 1741, the Spanish government established the Regimiento Fijo de Puerto Rico. Many of the former slaves, now freeman, either joined the Fijo or the local civil militia. Puerto Ricans of African ancestry played an instrumental role in the defeat of Sir Ralph Abercromby in the British invasion of Puerto Rico in 1797.

From 1790 onwards, the number of slaves more than doubled as a result of the radical transformation of the sugar industry in the island.