Mexican secularization act of 1833

The Mexican Secularization Act of 1833, officially called the Decree for the Secularization of the Missions of California,^[1] was an act passed by the Congress of the Union of the First Mexican Republic which secularized the Californian missions. The act nationalized the missions, transferring their ownership from the Franciscan Order of the Catholic Church to the Mexican authorities.

The act was passed twelve years after Mexico won its independence from Spain in 1821. Mexico feared Spain would continue to have influence and power in California because most of the Spanish missions in California remained loyal to the Roman Catholic Church in Spain. As the new Mexican republic matured, calls for the secularization ("disestablishment") of the missions increased.^[2]^[3]

Once fully implemented, the secularization act took away much of the California Mission land and sold it or gave it away in large grants called ranchos.^[2]^[3] Secularization also emancipated Indigenous peoples of California from the missions and closed the monjeríos,^[4] although only a minority of Indigenous peoples were distributed land grants, which left many of them landless to work the ranchos.^[5]

^ Coleccion de leyes y decretos del Congreso General de la Nacion Megicana en los Años 1833 a 1835.
^ ^a ^b "Monterey County Historical Society, Local History Pages--Secularization and the Ranchos, 1826-1846". mchsmuseum.com. Retrieved 26 October 2017.
^ ^a ^b Land in California: The Story of Mission Lands, Ranchos, Squatters, Mining ... By William Wilcox Robinson, p. 29: The cortes (legislature) of New Spain issued a decree in 1813 for at least partial secularization that affected all missions in America and was to apply to all outposts that had operated for ten years or more; however, the decree was never enforced in California.
^ Schmidt, Robert A.; Voss, Barbara L. (2005). Archaeologies of Sexuality. Routledge. pp. 43–47. ISBN 978-1-134-59385-9.
^ Kling, David W. (2020). A history of Christian conversion. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. pp. 344–345. ISBN 978-0-19-006262-0. OCLC 1143823194.

[1] Coleccion de leyes y decretos del Congreso General de la Nacion Megicana en los Años 1833 a 1835.

[:0-2] "Monterey County Historical Society, Local History Pages--Secularization and the Ranchos, 1826-1846". mchsmuseum.com. Retrieved 26 October 2017.

[:1-3] Land in California: The Story of Mission Lands, Ranchos, Squatters, Mining ... By William Wilcox Robinson, p. 29: The cortes (legislature) of New Spain issued a decree in 1813 for at least partial secularization that affected all missions in America and was to apply to all outposts that had operated for ten years or more; however, the decree was never enforced in California.

[:5-4] Schmidt, Robert A.; Voss, Barbara L. (2005). Archaeologies of Sexuality. Routledge. pp. 43–47. ISBN 978-1-134-59385-9.

[:7-5] Kling, David W. (2020). A history of Christian conversion. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. pp. 344–345. ISBN 978-0-19-006262-0. OCLC 1143823194.

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