Editing New Spain (section)

=== Government ===
{{Main|Spanish colonization of the Americas#Civil governance}}
[[File:Mapa del Virreinato de la Nueva España (1794).svg|thumb|right|200px|In 1794]]
[[File:Mapa del Virreinato de la Nueva España (1819).svg|thumb|right|200px|In 1819]]

====Viceroyalty====
The Viceroyalty was administered by a [[viceroy]] residing in Mexico City and appointed by the [[Spanish monarchy|Spanish monarch]], who had administrative oversight of all of these regions, although most matters were handled by the local governmental bodies, which ruled the various regions of the viceroyalty. First among these were the ''[[Audiencia Real|audiencia]]s'', which were primarily superior tribunals, but which also had administrative and legislative functions. Each of these was responsible to the Viceroy of New Spain in administrative matters (though not in judicial ones), but they also answered directly to the [[Council of the Indies]].

====Captaincies general and governorates====
The [[Captaincy General]]s were the second-level [[administrative division]]s and these were relatively [[Autonomy|autonomous]] from the viceroyalty. The viceroy was captain-general of those provinces that remained directly under his command. [[Captaincy General of Santo Domingo|Santo Domingo]] (1535); [[Captaincy General of the Philippines|Philippines]] (1565); [[Captaincy General of Puerto Rico|Puerto Rico]] (1580); [[Captaincy General of Cuba|Cuba]] (1608); [[Captaincy General of Guatemala|Guatemala]] (1609); [[Captaincy General of Yucatán|Yucatán]] (1617); [[Provincias Internas|Commandancy General of the Provincias Internas]] (1776) (analogous to a dependent captaincy general). Two [[Governorate#Spanish Empire|governorate]]s, third-level administrative divisions, were established, the Governorate of [[Spanish Florida]] (Spanish: ''La Florida'') and the Governorate of [[Louisiana (New Spain)|Spanish Louisiana]] (Spanish: ''Luisiana'').

====High courts====
The high courts, or ''audiencias'', were established in major areas of Spanish settlement. In New Spain the high court was established in 1527, prior to the establishment of the viceroyalty. The First Audiencia was headed by [[Hernán Cortés]]'s rival [[Nuño de Guzmán]], who used the court to deprive Cortés of power and property. The crown dissolved the First Audiencia and established the Second Audiencia.<ref>{{harvp|Altman|Cline|Pescador|2003|p=69}}</ref>
The audiencias of New Spain were [[Real Audiencia of Santo Domingo|Santo Domingo]] (1511, effective 1526, predated the Viceroyalty); [[Real Audiencia of Mexico|Mexico]] (1527, predated the Viceroyalty); [[Real Audiencia of Panama|Panama]] (1st one, 1538–1543); [[Real Audiencia of Guatemala|Guatemala]] (1543); [[Real Audiencia of Guadalajara|Guadalajara]] (1548); [[Real Audiencia of Manila|Manila]] (1583). 

Audiencia districts further incorporated the older, smaller divisions known as [[governorate]]s (''gobernaciones'', roughly equivalent to [[provinces]]), which had been originally established by [[conquistador]]-governors known as ''[[adelantado]]s''. Provinces which were under military threat were grouped into [[Captaincy|captaincies general]], such as the Captaincies General of the Philippines (established 1574) and Guatemala (established in 1609), which were joint military and political commands with a certain level of autonomy. The viceroy was captain-general of those provinces that remained directly under his command.
[[File:Nocnopil Joseph de Yturrigaray.png|thumb|270x270px|Official document of the New Spain government in [[Nahuatl]] announcing the transfer of powers from the outgoing viceroy [[Félix Berenguer de Marquina]] to [[José de Iturrigaray]], who would serve until his arrest for his support of popular sovereignty in 1808.]]

====Local-level administration====
At the local level there were over two hundred districts, in both indigenous and Spanish areas, which were headed by either a ''[[Corregidor (position)|corregidor]]'' (also known as an ''alcalde mayor'') or a ''[[Cabildo (council)|cabildo]]'' (town council), both of which had judicial and administrative powers. In the late 18th century the [[Bourbon dynasty]] began phasing out the ''corregidores'' and introduced [[intendant]]s, whose broad fiscal powers cut into the authority of the viceroys, governors and ''cabildos''. Despite their late creation, these intendancies so affected the formation of regional identity that they became the basis for the nations of Central America and the first [[Mexican states]] after [[Mexican independence|independence]].

====Intendancies of the 1780s====
As part of the sweeping eighteenth-century administrative and economic changes known as the [[Bourbon Reforms]], the Spanish crown created new administrative units called [[Intendant (government official)|intendancies]], to strengthen central control over the viceroyalty. Some measures aimed to break the power of local elites in order to improve the economy of the empire. Reforms included the improvement of public participation in communal affairs, distribution of undeveloped lands to the indigenous and Spaniards, ending the corrupt practices of local crown officials, encouraging trade and mining, and establishing a system of territorial division similar to the model created by the government of France, already adopted in Spain.<ref>{{harvp|Haring|1947|pp=133–135}}</ref><ref>{{harvp|Lombardi|Lombardi|Stoner|1983|p=50}}</ref>

The establishment of intendancies was strongly resisted by the viceroyalties and general captaincies similar to the opposition in the Iberian Peninsula when the reform was adopted. Royal audiencias and ecclesiastical hierarchs opposed the reform for its intervention in economic issues, for its centralist politics, and the forced ceding of many of their functions to the intendants. In New Spain, these units generally corresponded to the regions or provinces that had developed earlier in the center, South, and North.<ref>{{harvp|Haring|1947|pp=133–135}}</ref><ref>{{harvp|Lombardi|Lombardi|Stoner|1983|p=50}}</ref>

Many of the intendancy boundaries became Mexican state boundaries after independence. The intendancies were created between 1764 and 1789, with the greatest number in the mainland in 1786: 1764 La Habana (later subdivided); 1766 Nueva Orleans; 1784 Puerto Rico; 1786 México, Veracruz, Puebla de Los Ángeles, Guadalajara, Guanajuato, Zacatecas, San Luis Potosí, Sonora, Durango, Oaxaca, Guatemala, San Salvador, Comayagua, León, Santiago de Cuba, Puerto Príncipe; 1789 Mérida.<ref>{{harvp|Haring|1947|pp=133–135}}</ref><ref>{{harvp|Lombardi|Lombardi|Stoner|1983|p=50}}</ref>