16 University of Caifornia Publicatios in History

 Jefferson expressed his view of the situation to Madison at the
time, saying:
 There seem to be a perfect aequieseenee in the opinion of the Government
respecting Oni. The public inrest certainly made his rejection expedient,
and aa that is a motive which It is not pleasant alray to avow, I think it
fortunate that the contending elam of Charles and Ferdinand furnished such
plausible ebarrassment to the question of right; for, on our principles I
presume, the right of the Junta to send a Minister could not be denied."

From this statement it is cear that the administration was simply
postponing the issue in the hope that the favored Napoleonic regime
might firmly establish itself in the Peninsula.
 Intercourse with the United States was by no means stopped,
 however. Onis, on his departure from Spain, had been instructed
 to remain in the United States, whether admitted as minister or
 not." This order was later made more definite by Busebio de Bar-
 daxi y Azara, one of the foreign ministers under the Regency.
 Bardaxi in instructions written April 21, 1810, reviewed the
 United States' policy of past years as he saw it He noted that the
 effort to maintain neutrality had been threatened by the Napo-
 leonic Wars, and that now; although in commerce the country had
 nothing to fear from France, she had much to fear from England.
 Bardaxi showed a tendency to overconfidence and complacence
 quite characteristic of him and of his contemporaries in Spain
 when he said that the United States government knew its interests
 too well to risk a war with anybody, and that "it is ridiculous for
 her to imagine she is in a condition to make a war.'" Ridiculous as
 it may have seemed to him, the war was soon to come, and to affect
 Spanish interests materially. The same complacence is seen in his
 remark, in reply to Ons' warning of the presence of French con-
 spirators in America, that "they should not give much concern,
 because happily we live in times in which adventurers make very
 little progress wherever they present themselves."
 For the time being, commercial needs were of paramount impor-
 tance in the policy toward the United States. This was shown in
 these same instructions to Onis when Bardazi said that amicable
 relations should be sought, chiefly to encourage the continuation
 of United States shipment of foodstuffs to the Peninsula. Al-
 though under ordinary circumstances the nonrecognition of Onis
 would have been considered an insult, it was now deemed advisable