Empresario

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

An empresario was somebody who, in the early years of the settlement of Texas, had been granted the right to settle on Mexican land in exchange for recruiting and taking responsibility for new settlers. The word is taken from the Spanish language.

As part of both an effort to halt American expansion into Mexican territory and to colonize the scarcely populated northern region, the Mexican government began a colonization campaign in the early 19th century.

Prior to the 1823 revolution in Mexico, the old Imperial Law called for the appointment of empresarios, or land agents, who received a land grant from the Spanish or Mexican government in return for promoting settlement in the land grant territory. Settlers on land grants agreed to become a Spanish citizen (later Mexican citizen), swear an oath of loyalty to Spain and become a Roman Catholic. Among the most successful empresarios were Stephen F. Austin (son of Moses Austin) who sold land to American settlers for about 12 cents an acre one fifteenth the price of comparable land in the USA, considered by many the "Father of Texas"; Green DeWitt; and Haden Harrison Edwards.

After the Republic of Texas won its independence from Mexico, the young nation continued its own version of the empresario program, offering grants to French diplomat Henri Castro and abolitionist Charles Fenton Mercer, among others.