Additionally, in the wake of the implementation of comercio libre (free internal trade) by Jose de Galvez, merchants in Spanish America petitioned the crown for new consulados. These consulados would be institutions that resolved commercial disputes and developed the infrastructure of the colony. Moreover, the consulados would be in charge of trying to implement innovative economic projects. The consulados demonstrated an effort on the part of Spain that, unlike other Atlantic empires, seemed to make a real effort to integrate its American colonies as essential parts of not just Spain's colonial empire, but also as provinces of the monarchy and not simply far away lands. Just as in many of the other changes made by the crown, the consulados also functioned to shift power away from the creole elite and into the hands of peninsular Spaniards. As the consulados controlled internal economic circuits, when the Creoles lost control of these roles in government they also lost much of their control of trade and economic systems, further destabilizing their established power in the colonies.