Criminal Justice in Eighteenth Century Mexico: A STudy of The Tribunal of the Acordada by Colin M MacLachlan (1936- ) - 1974

viii+147 pages with index. Octavo (9 3/4" x 5 3/4") bound in original publisher's brown cloth with gilt lettering to spine in original jacket. First edition. The Acordada began as an expedient, authorized by the new Bourbon government in eighteenth-century Spain, to cope with a Mexican epidemic of banditry coupled with vagrancy. It was a variety of self-help agency that soon became the principal law-enforcement body in Mexico. In this workmanlike monograph, Colin MacLachlan recounts the history of an institution arising in response to changing conditions, especially population increase, and to altered governmental policies often refereed to as the Bourbon reforms. Condition: Jacket edge wear with chips and tears, spine ends chipped else a very good copy in like jacket.