San Francisco, a history of the Pacific coast metropolis, Volume II, Part 1

Author: Young, John Philip, 1849-1921
Publication date: 1912
Publisher: Chicago, The S. J. Clarke Pub. Co
Number of Pages: 738

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GEN

ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 1833 00865 3013

GENEALOGY 979.402 SA519Y V. 2

M. L.

GENEALOGY COLLECTION

SAN FRANCISCO

A HISTORY OF THE PACIFIC COAST METROPOLIS

By JOHN P. YOUNG

VOLUME II

THE S. J. CLARKE PUBLISHING COMPANY CHRONICLE BUILDING, SAN FRANCISCO PONTIAC BUILDING, CHICAGO

1259355

VOLUME II THE SPECULATIVE PERIOD 1871-1883

CHAPTER XLVII

LABOR AND OTHER TROUBLES DURING THE SEVENTIES

TRANSCONTINENTAL RAILROAD BRINGS DISAPPOINTMENT-GROWTH OF THE ANTI MO- NOPOLY SENTIMENT-DEMANDS OF THE FARMERS- THE "DOLLY VARDEN" PARTY- BRYCE INVESTIGATES CALIFORNIA CONDITIONS-FRAUDULENT LAND GRANTS-THE PROGRESSIVE PLATFORM OF 1912 FORESHADOWED IN 1877-REVIVAL OF THE CHI- NESE QUESTION-THE FIRST APPEARANCE OF DENIS KEARNEY IN POLITICS-IRRIGA- TION AND SMALL LAND HOLDINGS-DIVERSIFICATION OF PRODUCTION-POLITICAL ACTIVITIES OF WORKINGMEN.

HE decade 1870 did not open auspiciously for San Fran- cisco or the State of California. In an address delivered to the State Agricultural society in the opening year the speaker, A. A. Sargent, took for his theme the slow growth of the state. He dwelt at length on the difficulty of ob- taining farming lands cheaply, and denounced the evils SA of monopoly, and suggested the necessity of remedial leg- islation. Among other things he spoke of the disappointment experienced by the people who had expected that the completion of the transcontinental railroad would give a great impetus to business. Instead of this hope being realized merchants, manufacturers and others, he declared, had been brought into sharp competition with the East and were suffering in the process of readjustment.

He did not fail to touch upon the existing social condition which, he said, was the outcome of the "flush times" of the state. Habits of extravagance, he told his hearers, had been bred which must be abandoned, because they would prove an obstacle to development if they were continued; and he spoke of the anomalous state of the labor market, intimating that it must adapt itself to the imminent change which closer relations with the East would necessarily bring about. On this latter point he touched lightly, leaving his hearers to infer that the adjust- ment would not prove difficult if the Spanish land grants could be broken up, and the state settled with small farmers.

Sargent voiced one form of dissatisfaction. Governor Newton Booth in a mes- sage to the legislature of 1872 gave expression to another. He too objected to monopoly, but he found fault chiefly with the monopolistic tendencies of the cor- porations, the principal offenders being the men who had constructed the Central Pacific railroad. He recommended the immediate repeal of the five per cent sub- sidy act, which permitted the state and its political subdivisions to extend aid to railroads, and strongly urged that freights and fares be regulated "in view of the tendency of railroads to consolidate and become monopolies." He was particularly

Disappointed Hopes

Extrava- gance Deprecated

Railroad Regulation Demanded

477

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severe in his animadversions upon the device by which the Central Pacific managers were enabled to make contracts with themselves, and said that "the organizations of corporations within corporations is a refinement of subtlety and frand which should be prevented by law."

An Anti- Monopoly Governor Elected

In these recommendations and reflections he was adhering closely to the plat- form of the republican convention which nominated him, and in which a demand was made for an amendment to the constitution preventing the enactment of subsidy laws, and demanding the immediate repeal of the five per cent subsidy act, which had been passed by the preceding legislature. In the election of September 6, 1871, which resulted in Booth's selection, he received 62,500 votes to 57,500 for Haight, his democratic opponent. The latter, as well as the former, had adopted the anti monopoly slogan; but while the discussions of the campaign revolved abont this particular question, voters were merely called upon to decide which candidate would prove the sincerest anti monopolist. An idea of the depth of popular feeling on the subject may be gained from a comparison of the figures of the national election held a year later, when Grant received 8,000 less votes than Booth polled in 1871, and in which nearly 25,000 fewer votes were cast for president than for governor.

Crusade Against Monopoly

In 1873 the anti railroad feeling had developed to such an extent that it en- grossed the entire attention of voters. The Patrons of Husbandry began an agita- tion, the effects of which were subsequently witnessed in national legislation, for an adjustment of railroad freight rates on a basis which would exclude the prin- ciple of meeting sea competition. Their demand was for a railroad tariff which would prevent a proportionately greater charge for hauling a short than a long distance. In 1873 the Patrons of Husbandry threw their strength to the wing of the republican party, which was antagonizing the railroad, and in the election of- September 3 of that year the combination proved strong enough to win a majority in the legislature, the result heing the election of Governor Newton Booth to the United States senate as an avowed antagonist of the Central Pacific railroad and its schemes to extend its power.

Demands of the Grangers

The alliance between the "Dolly Vardens," as the anti monopoly republicans were called, and the Patrons of Husbandry did not endure long. The platform of the agriculturalists had more planks than that of opposition to railroad exactions, and some of them were not acceptable, and as a result the "Dolly Vardens" went to pieces, and the legislators elected by that party resumed their former partisan relations. As a matter of fact the grangers were too advanced in their views and advocated a programme more in harmony with the sentiment of 1912 than of 1873. They urged that grain sacks should be made and sold by the state in order to destroy an existing ring by selling at cost, thus regulating the prices at which bags should be sold; they asked for the creation of a cooperative bank, and a cooperative system of selling agricultural supplies, and they demanded that facilities should be provided for the free storage of grain so that the farmer might be able to hold his product until the market price proved satisfactory.

Grangers Satisfied

Although the political alliance of grangers and republicans was short lived it is interesting to note that the demands of the Patrons of Husbandry a few years later were practically conceded by the party in power. A law was passed which provided for the manufacture in the state prison of grain bags. An expensive plant was established at San Quentin, and the product was sold at cost to the farm-

479

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ers. While the result may not have been all that was hoped for, there is no doubt that the prison-made product of grain bags after the Eighties prevented the extor- tionate practices of a limited number of importers who had for many years manip- ulated the San Francisco market to the disadvantage of the farmer. There is no means of determining, however, whether the operations of the state were a profit- able or losing venture, for the system of accounting of the prison was not devised to furnish such information. The demand for the free storage of grain was also conformed to in a modified fashion by the erection of grain sheds on the San Fran- cisco sea wall by the State Harbor Commission. This system was not designed to warehouse grain for extended periods, but would have undoubtedly developed along those lines had California continued producing cereals on a scale which would have made exportation necessary. The cooperative bank project did not material- ize as a public institution, but a concern originally under the auspices of the grangers was started which flourished for a while in San Francisco and then met the fate which usually attends bad financial management.

In the election of 1875 the "Dolly Vardens" were wholly obliterated. Bidwell, their candidate for governor, received only 29,752 votes, while Irwin, who was put up by the democrats, polled 61,500. The election of the latter, however, by no means indicated an abatement of the hostility to the railroad. The corporation had taken advantage of a temporary distraction, and by clever manipulation had suc- ceeded in resuming its interrupted control of public affairs. The speculative ex- citement which followed the discovery of the rich ore body in the Comstock, known as the big bonanza, had produced a business flurry which resembled prosperity, and as usual under such circumstances, there was a cessation of agitation. There was also an adroit and successful attempt to concentrate attention on public of- fenders which for the time being diverted assaults from the corporation. In his first message on December 9, 1875, Irwin spoke of "the worse than state prison felons, the unconvicted embezzlers of public moneys and the violators of public trust." It was just about this time that the slogan framed for the democratic party by Samuel J. Tilden, "turn the rascals out" became popular, and the wave struck California with such force that the people, for a while at least, were con- vinced that malfeasance in office was at the bottom of all their troubles, and that the proper remedy to apply would be a change of officials.

In a message to the legislature Governor Irwin asserted "that the immunity or at least the apparent immunity with which public officers have appropriated to their own use the public funds by an almost open violation of the trusts committed to them has apparently impressed on the lower grade and even average public mind the conviction that to rob the government is legitimate, and that not to do so when one has an opportunity argues a lack of business talent," and there is no doubt that he was in earnest when he added that "society is therefore bound in self pro- tection, in self preservation to crush out this sentiment utterly," and that he really wished to find a remedy when he asked: "How can this be done? I answer, only by pursuing and hunting down with tireless energy and punishing with remorse- less vigor the guilty violator of a public trust." But the fact remains the tireless energy and the remorseless vigor of punishment he spoke of were not exercised, and that the failure in this regard furnished Kearney and the so-called "sand lot- ters" one of their most formidable weapons in the active agitation which began a couple of years later.

Dolly Varden Party Beaten

Governor Irwin Denounces Official Corruption

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Bryce's Investiga- tion of California Conditions

Men are wiser after the event, and therefore we need not be surprised that James Bryce, when he came to California to make a study of conditions, did not make the blunder of attributing the upheaval which resulted in the adoption of the con- stitution of 1879 to the discontent of the laboring classes of San Francisco or the machinations of agitators who took advantage of race prejudice to promote their own ends. It is true that he was misled into placing more emphasis on a manifes- tation than the cause which prompted it, but he put his finger on the sore spot when in speaking of large land holdings he said: "Some of these speculators by hold- ing their lands for a rise made it difficult for immigrants to acquire small freeholds, and in some cases checked the growth of farms. Others let their lands on short leases to farmers, who thus came into a comparatively precarious, and often neces- sitous condition ; others established enormous farms in which the soil is cultivated by hired laborers, many of whom are discharged after the harvest-a phenomenon rare in the United States, which everybody knows is a country of moderately sized farms, owned by persons who do most of their labor by their own and their chil- dren's hands. Thus the land system of California presents features both peculiar and dangerous, a contrast between great properties, often appearing to conflict with the general weal, and the sometimes pressed hard farmer, together with a mass of unskilled labor thrown without work into the towns at certain seasons of the year."

This condition of affairs was perfectly known to Californians for many years anterior to the Kearney sand lot troubles, and there was in their case an added knowledge of which no account is taken in the quotation, which had been a source of irritation for years, and for which a remedy had been vainly sought. The fraudulent character of the titles of many of the large holdings was understood by the people, who also knew that among the chief beneficiaries of the betrayals of public trust which Governor Irwin excoriated were the owners of great Spanish and Mexican grants, who corruptly influenced assessors to undervalue their hold- ings in order that they might the easier perpetuate their power. From 1851, when the commission was created by congress to inquire into the validity of the grants until the end of its hearings there was a general belief that most of the land grants were fraudulent, and it was not dissipated wholly when its report was made show- ing that ont of a total of 813 claims, calling in the aggregate for 12,000,000 acres or 20,000 square miles, 514 were confirmed. And when subsequently ninety of the rejected claims were finally confirmed by the United States courts, the belief was not weakened, although the decisions were acquiesced in and even welcomed be- cause they put an end to uncertainty.

To find the origins of this dissatisfaction it is necessary to go back to the early Fifties, when what was called the "Preemptioners' League" was formed in Alameda county by men who were referred to as squatters, but who included in their organ- ization many who afterward were known as substantial citizens. They planted themselves on the proposition that the grants were fraudulent and were quite ready to resist all claims to the ownership of large tracts of land, no matter what the title. It is not surprising that they were imbued with distrust when they found such claims as the Santillan, which set up ownership to all the land of the City and county of San Francisco south of California street. This grant, which was al- leged to have been made to Prudencio Santillan in 1846 by the Mexican governor, Pio Pico, was confirmed by the land commission March 1, 1855, but appealed to

The Bogus Santilian Grant

Fraudulent Land Grants

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the United States supreme court, which threw it out in 1860, pronouncing it an unmitigated fraud.

The agitation of the land question in San Francisco in the beginning of the Seventies was not connected with or influenced in any manner by claims touching directly the interests of its citizens. All the vexed title questions were settled in the City before that date and they had left little aftermath of bad feeling. But the condition in the country was different. In the City the land had been cut up and had passed into many hands ; and in the country at the opening of the decade most of the large Spanish and Mexican grants were still intact, and those into whose pos- session they had come seemed determined to hold onto them by "hook or crook." It was this attitude, and the means taken to maintain it which started the anti monopoly crusade; and when it was entered upon by the workingmen in the City they were merely championing the cause of the small land holder, in whom they recognized their natural ally.

It has already been noted that there were numerous meetings of the unem- ployed in 1870 and that in July of that year the Knights of St. Crispin advocated the nomination of a political ticket, meeting, however, with opposition from the Mechanics States Council and Eight Hour League. In March, 1871, a branch of the National Labor Union was formed in California and in January of the suc- ceeding year a convention was held by which a platform was adopted which not only foreshadowed the demands contained in that of the workingmen's party in 1877-78, but also bears a striking resemblance to that of the advanced Progressives of 1912. Among its most pronounced features we find these pronouncements and demands:

The equalization of the wages of labor with the income of capital.

The establishment of equitable rates of interest for the use of money.

The maintenance of an eight hour day system of labor.

The establishment of a labor bureau at Washington for the better protection of the industries of the country.

The government holds the public land in trust for the use and benefit of the people, and it should be distributed to actual settlers only in limited quantities not exceeding 160 acres, at the cost of survey and distribution.

All unimproved land should be taxed the same as though settled and improved. There should be universal compulsory citizen suffrage and secular education.

Government should assume control of all chartered and subsidized corporations, and regulate their charges on the principles of equity and exact justice, and enforce such regulations as will best secure the interests and safety of people.

The election of president and vice president and senators by direct vote of the people.

If there is any plank in this remarkable platform formulated forty years ago which the Progressives of 1912 have failed to adopt it should be pointed out. Nevertheless, in 1872, the framers were regarded as visionaries and when in 1878 the workingmen's party of California reembodied them in a pronouncement they were denounced as socialistic and incendiary. The history of a city does not per- mit indulgence in extended economic discussion, but it is desirable in this connec- tion to point out that the enunciated principles of the men who afterward devel- oped into sand lotters in 1872 differed in no essential particular from those of the advanced reformers of today and that the entire movement which began in the

Platform of 1912 Progressives Anticipated

Working- men's Piat- form of 1871

Socialists Then; Pro- gressives Now

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year 1871 and culminated in the constitution of 1879, has been grossly misrepre- sented and misunderstood.

A Popular Movement

That it was a popular and not a workingman's movement will be more clearly comprehended by the reader when additional facts are presented. It will be seen when the recital is completed that it was in no sense a trades union demonstration. A careful investigator of the activities of these organizations tells us that "one hears but little of the regular trades unions between 1870 and 1880." The sound- ness of this observation is well attested. The convention which formulated the platform quoted above through its executive committee announced in June, 1872, that "in all future elections the labor party of California would place nominees before the people for each elective office, and even prescribed the manner of mak- ing selections, but nothing of the sort was done until 1878, when the unions adopted the plan in nominating their candidates for the constitutional convention.

Effect of Temporary Prosperity

Doubtless had the conditions which produced the convention remained un- changed the trades union solidarity of the sixty decade might have been restored, but the speculative era interrupted and for a time obscured the hostility to Chinese immigration which had asserted itself in a pronounced manner during the Sixties, and earlier. That it was merely dormant was shown by the promptness with which the Chinese question was revived and became a dominant one as soon as the shoe of hard times began to pinch. While the big bonanza excitement was having its run, and all classes of the community from top to bottom were infected with the fever of mining speculation, the evil results of permitting the state to be filled with a class of immigrants that might be utilized to develop its resources along certain lines agreeable to large land holders were lost sight of, and during the brief period of meretricious "flushness" views were at times advanced which sug- gested to the careless observer that there was a real division of opinion in Califor- nia respecting the desirability of introducing this class of labor into the country.

Chinese Question Revived

It is necessary to remind the reader that this manifestation was misleading in order to remove the false impression that the hostility which later developed itself was due to the activities of the labor unions of San Francisco or to the unreason- ing prejudices of the working classes of the City. As was shown in earlier chap- ters the antagonism to Chinese immigration was not based on race prejudice. It is true that in the mines there were frequent clashes, and the Chinese were occa- sionally subjected to assaults, but these were manifestations of the "know nothing- ism" of the period, the creed of which was hostility to all foreigners, and was not inspired by racial differences. The action of the municipal council in 1850 in officially extending to the "China Boys" an invitation to take part in the funeral ceremonies of President Taylor, and similar courtesies, give evidence that there was no serious friction; and that the subject when it came up for discussion, as it frequently did, was treated in a large way, proves that the step subsequently taken by the people of California was not in response to riotous demands of the working people of San Francisco, but to the development of a settled conviction that the interests of the state and the American nation would be subserved by excluding a class of aliens whose assimilation would be impossible.

Conquest of China Suggested

It is wise in studying the anti Chinese movement in San Francisco to keep in mind the unsettled conditions respecting immigration that prevailed throughout the Union. If due consideration is given to the force of the Know Nothing propaganda, and the intolerance begotten by the manifest destiny idea, which seethed in the

53º

"MEN OF MARK." HRANIFY & PHLOFSON PHOTO & F

BRADLEY & RULOFSON'S "MEN OF MARK."

1. Sir Harry Parks.

2. Iwakura, Japanese Minister.

3. Hon. P. A. Jennings. Australia.

4. Mark Twain, Humorist.

3. Hon. R. €. Mel ormek, M. C., Ar.zona.

6. Right Reverend Bishop Kipp.

". Hun Leland Stantoni, ex-Governor, Cal.

s. General Colton. C. P. R. R. Duke de Penthieviv. French Nuvy.

IO. F. I .. Pioche, Capitalist.

11. Sır Daniel Cooper " Baronet."

Win. (. Ralston, Banker.

13. Mrs. Partington-Mr. I. B. Shillaber.

14. Win. Laird MeGregor, Gentleman, London.

15 .. Howard C'oite. Buard of Brokers. Harun von Reibnitz, German Navy.

Admiral Winslow, U. S. N.

18. Hon, HI. H. Haight, ex-Governor, Cal.

21%.

21. JJudge Muller.

22. 'Hemy Rochefort, Comunist.

23. Loyd Tevis, Wells Fargo & Co.

21. Baron von Holleben, German Minister.

25. Col. W. H. L. Barnes, Lawyer.

26. Duke of Manchester.

27. Brigadier-General George Crook, U. S. A. 61. Harry Mriggs.

28. Prof. Lu Agassiz, Naturalist.

29. Admiral Farquhaar, R. N.

34. Admiral Farragut, U. S. N.

31. Poiro Mezarra, Senlptor.

: 32. Postmaster Coey, 8. F.

Hon. Romaldo Pacheco, ex-Governor, Cal. Admiral Army, U. S. N.

35. Octavio Pavy, Artic Explorer.

36. Hon. Newton Booth, Senator, Cal.

37. Prof. D. (. Gilman, U'niversity, Baltimore.

38. General Melellan, L'. S. A.

39. Bret Hart, Poct.

40. Joaquin Miller, Poet.

41. Charles IN.Long, ex-U. S. Minister, Japan. Wm. N. O'Brien, Capitalist.

43. Jas. C. Flood, Capitalist.

44. Count von Moltke, German Navy.

45. Hon. A. J. Bryant, Mayor, S. F.

Judge bwinnell, District Court.

46. 47. Charles Crocker, (. P. R. R.

48. Brigadier-General John McComb, N. G. C.

19. . Reverend L. F. Hammond, " Revivalist."

51). Hon. Nathan ( lifford. U. S. Supreme Court. 51. Hon. H. Peirce, U. N. Minister, Honolulu.

52. Viscount of Bom-Ratero, Brazil.

53. Arthur T. de Muurdu, Brazil.

54. Hon. Thos. HI. Selby, ex-Mayor, S. F.

55. Peter Donahue, Capitalist.

56. Nır Grorge Ferguson Bowen, Australia,

57. Hon. Win. M. Stewart, Benatur, Nev.

58. James Fair, Capital

59. Wmn. Bradford, Artin Painter.

60. General LaGrange, Sup't. Mint.+

62. . H. I. M. Dom Pedro, Emperor of Brazil.

63, General Sherman, U. S. A.

64. Hon. Simon Cameron, Statesman, Penn.

65. Milton S. Latham, Banker-

66. Hon. John P. Jones, Senafor, Nev.

67. Hon. Sargent, Renator, Cal

68. Judge Delos Lake.

69. Hon. Wm. Irwin, Governor Cal. 70. James J. O'Kelly, N. Y. Herald. 71. Lord D'Arcy Osborne.

72. Fred. McCrellish, S. F. Alta.

73. Phil. Roach, S. F. Examiner.

74. H. R. M. King Kalakaua, H. I. 75. Judge Stephen J. Field, U. S. Court .. 76. Fred. Marriott, S. F. News Letter. 77. Hon. Cornelius Cole, ex-Senator, Cal. 78. Cyrus W. Field, first ocoan catde.

Loring Pickering, S. F. Builetin.

NO. Hon. Wm. Alvord, ex-Mayor, S. F.

81. B. T. Barnum, Esqr., New York.

82. Hon. P. C. Cheney, Governor, New Ham. Win. Lane Booker, British Consul, S. P.

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San Francisco, a history of the Pacific coast metropolis, Volume II, Part 1

Author: Young, John Philip, 1849-1921 Publication date: 1912 Publisher: Chicago, The S. J. Clarke Pub. Co Number of Pages: 738

Author: Young, John Philip, 1849-1921
Publication date: 1912
Publisher: Chicago, The S. J. Clarke Pub. Co
Number of Pages: 738