Enabling: the Behavior of an Enabler. Enable has a number of senses, most of which are some variant on allowing someone (or something, such as enabling cookies on a computer) to do something.
The assertion of royal control over the Kingdom of New Spain and the initial Spanish conquerors took over a decade, with importance of the region meriting the creation of the Viceroyalty of New Spain. Established by Charles V in 1535, the first viceroy was Don Antonio de Mendoza.
The British, then, were among the last of the great European powers to gain colonial influence in North America. As the map below of world colonization by the mid-1700s indicates, Spain and France had a much greater foothold in the Americas than the English.