300 AMERICAN DIPLOMATIC QUESTIONS 



The truth is that the patriots of Spain have no warmer friends 

 than the administration of the United States ; but it is our duty 

 to say nothing and to do nothing for or against either. If they 

 succeed we shall be well satisfied to see Cuba and Mexico remain 

 in their present dependence, but very unwilling to see them in 

 that of either France or England, politically or commercially. 

 We consider their interests and ours as the same, and that the 

 object of both must be to exclude all European influence from 

 this hemisphere. 



In this statement from high authority the historian 

 Schouler finds the germ of the Monroe Doctrine. When 

 the Spanish dependencies began to declare their indepen- 

 dence, and the grasp of the Old World upon the new one 

 began to loosen, Jefferson's bold statement found active 

 support in all directions. Henry Clay, the leader of his 

 party in Congress, exerted himself to the limit of his 

 oratorical powers in the "emancipation of South America." 

 The continual assaults upon the administration of Monroe 

 by this opposition leader may have caused the President 

 to recognize the independence of the revolted colonies sooner 

 than he otherwise would have done, although it is clear from 

 the words of nearly all his annual messages, that Monroe 

 had his heart in the success of freedom's cause in the 

 Western Hemisphere quite as fully as had Clay, but he 

 moved more cautiously and with far more deliberation than 

 the eloquent and impetuous member from Kentucky. In 

 the autumn of 1817, the first year of Monroe's presidency, 

 he sent a commission to South America for the purpose of 

 investigating the political conditions and of determining if 

 there were any bona fide revolutionary governments norths 

 of recognition. The commission was composed of men 

 well-known for their radical views of republicanism, yet in 

 this respect they differed in regard to the proper course to be 

 pursued by the United States in the matter of recognizing 

 the sovereignty of the seceding Spanish colonies. 



In the midst of cabinet discussions regarding this ques- 

 tion, news suddenly came from abroad (during the early 

 part of 1818) that a movement had been inaugurated in 



