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Asia-Pacific in the Making of the Americas: Toward a Global History

Legal Classification of the Chinese Mestizo

As unions between Chinese immigrants and local women grew, so did the number of Chinese mestizo children. By the middle of the eighteenth century, the Spanish colonial government had established a separate legal classification for Chinese mestizos for tax purposes. In areas where there was a significant number of Chinese mestizos, the taxation system worked in the following manner: indios, who constituted the majority of the population, paid the least amount of taxes but were required to render six weeks of free labor (polo) to work on public projects; Chinese mestizos paid twice the tax; and the Chinese paid the most.[5]

Spanish law classified male descendants of Chinese paternal ancestors as Chinese mestizos, even after several generations.[6] However, both Chinese mestizos and indios could change their legal classification for tax purposes. This occurred primarily in the provinces, but Chinese mestizos in urban areas preferred to retain their status. Some rich indios also aspired to be classified Chinese mestizos because being a Chinese mestizo meant that one belonged to the higher socio-economic stratum in society.[7]

The situation was different for female descendants in terms of switching legal classifications. Only through marriage could a Chinese mestiza change her status. A Chinese mestiza marrying a Chinese mestizo or a Chinese man remained within the Chinese mestizo classification, as did her children. Anyone who married an indio or Spaniard assumed her husband’s classification, along with her children.[8]
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^{[5] It is not clear whether the Chinese mestizos had to render such labor services. According to Wickberg, in some areas they were required, but in some they were not (2000, 31).
[6] Edgar Bernard Wickberg, The Chinese in Philippine Life, 1850-1898 (Quezon City: Ateneo de Manila University Press, 2000), 33.; Eliodoro G. Robles, The Philippines in the Nineteenth Century (Quezon City: Malaya Books Inc., 1969), 77.
[7] Wickberg, The Chinese in Philippine Life, 33-44.
[8] Presumably, an india became a Chinese mestiza when she married a Chinese mestizo.}

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Carta Hydrographica y Chorographica de las Yslas Filipinas — Sangley Details Detail of Carta Hydrographica y Chorographica de las Yslas Filipinas (1734), by Pedro Murillo Velarde. The Philippines was a vital part of the Spanish Empire, and the map shows the maritime routes from Manila to Spain and to New Spain. There are twelve engravings on the sides depicting different ethnic groups living in the archipelago and cartographic descriptions of particular cities or islands. From the National Library of Spain.
Carta Hydrographica y Chorographica de las Yslas Filipinas — Mestizo Details Detail of Carta Hydrographica y Chorographica de las Yslas Filipinas (1734), by Pedro Murillo Velarde. The Philippines was a vital part of the Spanish Empire, and the map shows the maritime routes from Manila to Spain and to New Spain. There are twelve engravings on the sides depicting different ethnic groups living in the archipelago and cartographic descriptions of particular cities or islands. From the National Library of Spain