Republicans were to bend all their efforts in order to avoid a formal declaration of war. In the meantime the dispatches of the envoys were made public and the famous X.Y.Z. case came to light. Debate was hot in Congress on the Sprigg resolution declaring that "under existing conditions it is not expedient for the United States to resort to war against the French republic."[354] Adams then decided to communicate the letters from Paris. No more terrible blow could have been inflicted upon the friends of peace. Jefferson heard the news on April 3, but as it was still undecided whether they could be made public, he refrained from discussing them with Madison until the sixth. His first impressions were "very disagreeable and very confused." Yet he tried, as was his wont, to see both sides of the question. With the story of the abortive negotiations was interwoven ... some base propositions on the part of Talleyrand, through one of his agents, to sell his interest and influence with the Directory towards soothing difficulties with them, in consideration of a large sum (fifty thousand pounds sterling); the arguments to which his agent resorted to induce compliance with this demand were unworthy of a great nation (could they be imputed to them), and calculated to excite disgust and indignation in the Republicans particularly, whom they so far mistake, as to presume an attachment to France and hatred to the Federal party and not to the love of their country, to be their first passion. In the papers, as communicated, Adams had substituted for the names given by the envoys--Hottinger, Bellamy, and Hauteval--the initials X. Y. Z., hence the name given at once to the incident.