He was a Catholic President. As in the Colonial {218} period, politics centred upon the Church. The clergy taught and legislated. "The Church," said Garcia-Moreno, "must march side by side with the civil power under conditions of true independence." He entrusted public education to the religious congregations, and prepared to sign a _concordat_ with the Church; Catholicism was to be recognised as the State religion, to the exclusion of all foreign sects and cults, and the bishops would supervise the colleges and universities; they would choose the textbooks to be used, and the government, like the Spanish Inquisition, would see that no forbidden works were introduced. The ecclesiastical charter would be renewed, and as a set-off the government would annul the _exequatur_, the authorisation which the American governments accorded to the pontifical bulls, that these might be obeyed. More Catholic than the Sacred College, Garcia-Moreno insisted upon the reform of the clergy, despite the hesitation of the Pope. Once the Concordat was signed; Pius IX. created new dioceses, and ecclesiastical courts, which tried all causes relating to the faith--to religious matters in general, and to marriage and divorce. The conservative leader aspired to a Catholic Imperialism. He intervened in the domestic affairs of Colombia, where a radical President was in power; he eulogised the Mexican Empire, which was to deliver the country from the "excesses of a rapacious, immoral and turbulent demagogy." He dreamed of an America enfeoffed to the Papacy.