Jean-Baptiste Colbert, Instructions (1667, 1668)and
A Royal Ordinance (1669)
As monarchs sought to consolidate and enhance their power in the seventeenth century, they looked to colonization in the New World as a vital component of their state-building strategies. These strategies included a series of economic policies known as mercantilism designed to maximize domestic and colonial commerce and industry for the state’s benefit, all under the watchful eye of government bureaucrats. Jean-Baptiste Colbert (1619–1683), chief minister of finance and commerce during the reign of Louis XIV, was an especially active practitioner of mercantilism. For Colbert, the government’s intervention in the economy went hand in hand with strengthening the king’s rule at home and abroad. For this reason, he extended his mercantilist policies to France’s colonies in the northern Americas and the Caribbean islands. The documents below allow us to see these policies in action as Colbert worked to exert stronger royal control over the organization and regulation of French colonial affairs.
From Pierre Clément, ed., Lettres Instructions et Mémoires de Colbert. vol. 3, pt. 2, Instructions au Marquis de Seignlay: Colonies (Paris, 1865), trans. David Kammerling Smith in The West in the Wider World, vol. 2, by Richard Lim and David K. Smith (New York: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2003), 398, 400–401, 402–5, 657.
Instructions from Colbert to M. de la Rabesnières de Treillebois, Ship’s Captain, October 1, 1667
The King, having resolved to send a squadron of his ships to America in the Antilles Islands, commanded by Mr. de la Rabesnières de Treillebois, His Majesty wanted to inform [Treillebois] of the plans [the King] has proposed for this voyage, to guide his voyage so that it gains the advantages expected from his zeal, capacity, and experience in naval matters.
Thus, he will be informed that the plan of His Majesty is:
1. To assure the peace and tranquility of his subjects inhabiting these islands.
2. To assure the possession of the islands to the West India Company1 that His Majesty has created, to fortify its commerce, in excluding foreigners, and to oblige the inhabitants to submit themselves willingly to the regulations and ordinances of the Company.
3. To show to the English on the island of Barbados that His Majesty wants to protect [the Antilles] more strongly than ever before, in order to invite them to live in peace and execute in good faith the treaties between His Majesty and the King of England. . . .
5. To exclude from the commerce of the [Antilles] all foreigners. . . . His Majesty desires that in the visits that [Treillebois] will make on all the islands, if he encounters some foreign vessels, he will require them to justify whether or not they have permission from the West India Company. If they do, he will make them execute [the terms of this permission] punctually. But if they do not, His Majesty desires that [Treillebois] prevents them from loading or unloading anything in the islands, that he gives them 24 hours to raise their sails and leave, and if this time passes, he seizes or sinks them, His Majesty previously having forbidden all foreigners from trafficking in the islands. His Majesty also wants him to visit all foreign ships and to reclaim the Frenchmen whom he finds in their crews.
Instructions from Colbert to M. de Bouteroue, Departing as Intendant2 for Justice, Police, and Finances in Canada, April 5, 1668
Principal Issues to Which the Intendant Sent by the King to Canada Should Apply Himself
Immediately after his arrival, he [Bouteroue] must make a general census of all the inhabitants of the country, noting their age, sex, and estate, marital status, and number of children.
Inform himself, every three months, of the number of deaths, births, and marriages.
Renew the census every year to know if the colony has grown.
The growth of the colony must be the guiding principle and goal of all the intendant’s conduct, so that he is never satisfied on this point, and must apply himself incessantly to find all the expedients imaginable to preserve the inhabitants, to multiply them by marriages, and to attract new people. . . .
Excite, by all methods possible, the people to work to clear land for good agriculture, to establish manufacturing, and to develop some maritime trade. . . .
Investigate with great care the mines within the country, such as those of coal, iron, and lead, and establish work there. . . .
With regard to spiritual matters, the opinion of [those in the colony] is that the bishop of Pétrée3 and the Jesuits establish their authority too strongly by the fear of excommunications and by the too strict of life that they want to maintain.
The intendant must observe all which occurs on this issue without taking part in blaming their [the Jesuits’] conduct, but only in regarding and esteeming them as men of an exemplary piety who have contributed a lot to the discovery and preservation of this country, intervening occasionally to bring them to soften this excessive strictness. It is very important that the bishop and the Jesuits never become aware that he would want to censure their conduct because he would render himself nearly useless to the service of the King. . . .
Up to now, it seems that the maxim of the Jesuits has been to not call the natural inhabitants of this country into common life with the French, either by giving them common lands and housing, by the education of their children, or by marriages. Their [the Jesuits’] reason was that they believe they will conserve the principles and holiness of our religion more purely in keeping the converted savages in their ordinary form of life rather than in bringing them among the French. As it is very easy to see how this maxim is far removed from all good management, as much for religion as for the State, it is necessary to act gently to make them change it and employ all temporal authority to attract the savages [to live] among the French, this which can be done by marriages and by the education of their children.
The commerce of wine and liquor with the savages . . . was a subject of perpetual conflict between the bishop of Pétrée and the Jesuits, on one hand, and the principal inhabitants and those who trade in this country, on the other. The Bishop and the Jesuits have claimed that these liquors intoxicate the savages, that the savages are not able to take them in moderation, and that drunkenness makes them lazy in hunting and gives them all sorts of bad habits, as much for religion as for the State. The principal inhabitants and the traders, to the contrary, claim that the desire to have liquor, which is traded by everyone, obliges the savages to go hunt with more diligence. It is necessary to examine these two sentiments, and the intendant give his reasoned opinion to the King.
Royal Ordinance, April 5, 1669
The king . . . [having reviewed documents on] the number of Frenchmen that the King has sent [to Canada] the previous four or five years, the number of families established there, the lands that have been cleared and cultivated, and everything that concerns the situation in that land, and having recognized the considerable growth that this colony has received by the care taken with it, it is hoped that in continuing these same cares, [the colony] will be able to support itself in a few years. And desiring that the inhabitants of this land participate in the favors that His Majesty has made to his people in consideration of the multiplicity of infants and to induce them to marriage, His Majesty has ordered and orders that in the future all the inhabitants of [the colony] who have as many as 10 living children, born in legitimate marriages, and being neither priests, monks, nor nuns, will be paid a pension of 300 livres4 annually, the money being remitted in the colony. And those who have a dozen children, 400 livres.
His Majesty desires further that it be paid by the orders of the intendant to all boys who marry at 20 years of age and younger and girls at 16 and younger,5 20 livres each on the day of their marriages, which will be called “the gift of the king.” . . .
[Ordered that] there be made a general division of all the inhabitants by parishes and villages; that some honors be created for the principal inhabitants who take care of the affairs of each town . . .; that those who have the greatest number of children always be given preference over others, unless some reason prevents it; that there be established some pecuniary penalty payable to the local hospitals against the fathers who do not marry off their children at the age of 20 for boys and 16 for girls.
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