A History of the Inquisition of Spain (Vol. 1-4). Henry Charles Lea
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by the process described above (p. 436) which became technically known as competencia. It is remarkable that, in the Valencia Concordia of 1554, there is no such provision, but in that of 1568, for the Aragonese kingdoms, it appears in the slightly different form that the regent of the Audiencia and the senior inquisitor should consult and endeavor to come to some agreement. If they could not do so, the regent was to send his side of the case to the Council of Aragon and the inquisitor his to the Suprema, when the king would arrange how the matter should be decided.[1227] The two formulas were combined in practice and remained the established method of settling conflicts of jurisdiction.
This should have produced peace but we have seen that it only gave occasion for fresh subjects of discord. The inquisitors were restive under any restraint on their arbitrary methods and already in 1560, a carta acordada of November 14th warns them that they are not to proceed with censures against the judges, when the latter offer competencias, but are to send the papers to the Suprema and await the result, under a penalty of twenty ducats for every infraction of the rule.[1228] The inquisitors however avoided competencias as far as they could and, when obliged to concede them, the opportunity was taken of humiliating the royal judges and make them feel their inferiority in a manner most galling to men so tenacious of the respect due to position and so insistent on courtesy. When de Soto Salazar reports of the inquisitors of Barcelona that, when they had occasion to notify the lieutenant of the king or the regent of the Audiencia, they sent a messenger to summon him and then kept him waiting in the antechamber and that sometimes they called the judges before them and scolded them without cause, we can readily appreciate the intensity of the hatred thus excited.[1229]
COMPETENCIAS
So, when the Inquisition established its formula for competencias, they were sedulously framed to be as arrogantly insulting as possible. The first mandate inhibits peremptorily the judge from action and orders him to remit the case to the tribunal within twenty-four hours. If an arrest has been made the prisoner is to be discharged on bail to present himself before the inquisitors and any property seized or sequestrated is to be released. If the secular judge has any reason to allege to the contrary he is to present himself in person or by procurator to the tribunal, which will render justice, and all this is under holy obedience and the threat of major excommunication and a heavy fine. If there are any papers in the case the scrivener is ordered to surrender them, and the accuser or plaintiff is to appear within a time specified and receive justice, in default of which the case will be heard without him and without further notice. Then, if a reply is made to this alleging reasons for not obeying, a second mandate is issued pronouncing them insufficient and ordering the first one to be obeyed within a specified time under the above penalties. If the judge then proposes a competencia, a mandate is sent to him reciting the previous ones and saying that, to avoid, troubling the higher powers, he is ordered to surrender all papers and suspend all action, or the excommunication and fine will be enforced on his person and property. The next mandate accepts the competencia, states that the tribunal is ready to forward its papers and orders the judges to send their side within twelve days, adding a threat of excommunication and fine if any additional testimony be taken in the case. All this is phrased in the most mandatory fashion as of a superior addressing a subordinate and all these missives are ordered to be returned to the tribunal. If, after a competencia was formed, the familiar or official accepted the jurisdiction of the secular court, he was deprived of his commission. As we have frequently seen, there was no hesitation, at any stage of the proceedings, to excommunicate the judges, to anathematize them and to lay an interdict on the city, followed by a cessatio a divinis.[1230]
In addition to the gratification of thus humiliating the magistrates, there was also in this truculence the object of rendering the process so offensive as to make them shrink from resisting the encroachments of the Inquisition. When this failed the tribunal had abundant sources of annoyance in raising interminable questions of precedence and formalities, which were sometimes fought so bitterly and long as virtually to supersede the original case. The points that could be raised were endless. In 1602, the Count of Benavente, then Viceroy of Valencia, issued letters ordering a conference over the arrest of Gerónimo Falcon; the tribunal surrendered him, admitting that the case did not pertain to it, but demanded that the viceroy and chancellery should cancel the letters on their records and, on refusal, it excommunicated the regent. The matter was carried up to the Suprema and Council of Aragon, when the king decided that the letters must be expunged and it was done in presence of a secretary of the Inquisition. The same humiliation had been inflicted on the count’s father, when he was viceroy, and also on the Duke of Segorbe.[1231]
This arrogance continued until Carlos III, in his decree of 1775, informed the Inquisition that the royal jurisdiction which it exercised was on precisely the same level as that of his judges and magistrates; there must be entire equality between them; all threats of excommunication and fines must be abandoned; there must be free interchange of papers, mutual courtesy and no assumption of superiority. It was difficult for the tribunals to abandon the formulas which flattered their vanity and a second command was necessary, issued in 1783, on the occasion of a prolonged conflict of the Valencia tribunal with the alcalde of Consentaina. This finally produced obedience and the Suprema transmitted the royal order to Valencia with instructions for its observance.[1232]
MODERATION UNDER THE RESTORATION
While this doubtless diminished the exasperation of these conflicts, it did not check their frequency. They continued to be a constant source of trouble and it was from a desire to diminish this, as well as to extend its authority, that the Suprema, in 1806, forbade the tribunals from instituting them without submitting the case to it and receiving its approval.[1233] When, under the Restoration, the Inquisition was revived, in 1814, the officials naturally claimed the fuero, active and passive, civil and criminal, and Fernando VII, in the decision of a case carried up to him from Seville, announced, February 15, 1815, in no uncertain tones, that they should be protected in its enjoyment, but the cases appear to be rare and the aggressive spirit had disappeared.[1234] When, in Seville, the creditors of Francisco de Paula Esquivol complained of him to the tribunal, in place of defending him, it promptly dismissed him, June 27, 1815, an action which was confirmed by the Suprema.[1235] Even more significant was a case, in 1816, when in Seville Lorenzo Ayllon abused a priest while celebrating mass and endeavored to seize the sacrament, and the secular authorities arrested and proceeded to try him. In such a case there could be no question as to the jurisdiction of the Inquisition, but there was no disturbance, and when the tribunal claimed his transfer to the secret prison the Suprema interposed and ordered that he should be allowed to remain in the public gaol, a detainer being lodged to prevent his discharge during his trial—a concession to the royal jurisdiction which would have petrified Pacheco or Arce y Reynoso.[1236]
There was the same disposition to avoid coming to extremes with the spiritual courts. In 1816 the provisor of the see of Tuy prosecuted Joseph Metzcler for impious, execrable and sacrilegious blasphemies. The tribunal of Santiago applied, in a courteous note, to the provisor for the papers and received a reply without signature. This the Suprema directed it to return and explain that there was no desire to invade the episcopal jurisdiction, but as the blasphemous propositions and acts of Metzcler might be heretical, of which the Inquisition had exclusive cognizance, it must insist on seeing the evidence to extract what appertained to it, after which the papers would be returned. It seems to have obtained the evidence for, on October 15, 1817, it voted to imprison Metzcler, as soon as his trial by the provisor should be ended, but the Suprema instructed it not to wait for this, as the jurisdiction of the Inquisition was privileged.[1237]
There was one peculiarly irritating feature in the position of the Inquisition in these quarrels, which exacerbated them greatly and often neutralized all efforts to maintain harmony—the power which it arrogated to itself of refusing to form competencias on the ground that its rights were too clear to admit of debate. Thus it held that the salaried and titular officials, with their families and servants, were so wholly beyond all secular jurisdiction that it refused to entertain any proceedings in contest of their claims. It was in vain that Philip III, by a royal letter of 1615, declared that if inquisitors refused a conference, on the ground that the matter was too clear to justify it, the regent of the chancellery should form a competencia and forward the papers as usual.[1238] It was equally useless for Philip IV to decree, in 1630, that when a contention