USA > California > San Francisco County > San Francisco > San Francisco, a history of the Pacific coast metropolis, Volume II > Part 34
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There were occasional distractions other than those mentioned whose import was scarcely recognized at the time, and some almost too puerile for mention, but on the whole the municipal history of San Francisco was not an exciting one during the period. The budgets of the Eighties and most of the Nineties are simply a rec- ord of increasing expenditures made possible by the expanding assessment roll. The city hall, the only public improvement of consequence, whose construction began in the first year of the Seventies, was uncompleted in the middle of the Nine- ties, and was at times the subject of scandal, and a never-failing source of fault finding for those who were impatient with its slow progress, and of still another class who recognized its defects. Sums were regularly appropriated for the care of Golden Gate park and the minor squares, and they were assuming a creditable shape, but the streets of the City presented an unkempt appearance, and there was little hope that they would be improved, because of the settled conviction of men in a position to shape public opinion that the basalt block laid on a sand foundation was an ideal pavement.
It was not difficult during the Eighties, and the better part of the Nineties to acquire the reputation of being a predatory person. To advocate improvements of any sort was sufficient to bring on an accusation of that sort, and to suggest that it might be desirable to abandon the hand-to-mouth method of doing things, and instead to resort to the mode followed by business men was branded as treason to the municipality. The obstructionists of progress were derided as "silurians," but their position could not be shaken. There were intervals during which there were dreams of making San Francisco "the Paris of America," but they always faded away when the taxpayer was confronted with the alternative of abandoning the cherished plan of paying as you go for the dangerous experiment of launch- ing forth on the dreaded sea of bonded indebtedness.
This condition of affairs endured until after the adoption of the new charter. It did not absolutely require the change in the organic law to put the spirit of progress in motion, but it made it easier to do so. In shaking off the restraints which the Consolidation Act and its amendments imposed the City began to take a broader view of its possibilities and lost some of its fearsomeness. The instru- ment adopted in 1898 was by no means a "wide open" affair; it contained limita- tions and restrictions innumerable which might have been invoked to prevent ex- pansiveness, but they were not resorted to becanse under the spur of outside criticism, and the rivalry of Los Angeles, San Franciscans were awakening to the necessity of doing something to redeem the City from the imputation of dry rot. The new charter may have been no improvement on the existing body of municipal law, and it probably did not improve the mechanism of the municipal government very greatly, but the people thought it did, and the belief served as a stimulus to exertion. In one particular, however, it made a wide departure. Its framers were caught in the rising tide of the municipal ownership idea and they made it possible
Increasing Municipal Expenditures
Abnormal Fear of Debt
Changes Worked by Charter of 1898
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for the City to engage in schemes which thus far have not realized the hopes of their projectors.
Economies Not Effected by Charter Changes
Although the changes effected by the new charter were fought so long it is doubtful whether the community was able to detect any particular difference in the conduct of affairs after its adoption. Many reforms were promised, and there was a vague idea prevalent that departure from the old modes of doing business would result in economies. In the Constitutional Convention of 1879 the author of the section providing for the framing of charters by a board of freeholders had answered the objection that the result would be a multiplication of officials by asserting that the tendency would be to reduce the number. He said: "Instead of having a set of City and a set of county officers they are consolidated. The tendency of a consolidated government is to reduce the officers from two to one in every sense, and reduce the expense in every particular." The same argu- ment had been employed when the Consolidation Act was imposed upon the City. Under the act of 1850 the City of San Francisco was provided with the following officers: mayor, recorder, board of aldermen, board of assistant aldermen, treasurer, controller, street commissioners, collector of city taxes, city marshal, city attorney and two assessors for each city ward. At the same time the County of San Francisco had a district attorney, county clerk, county attorney, county surveyor, county sheriff, recorder, assessor, coroner, treasurer, public administrator and county board of supervisors. The Consolidation Act of 1856 rid the taxpayer of many of these duplications, and the decided reduction in the cost of the administration of city affairs was in part dne to the elimination of unnecessary officials, but by far the greater part of the decreased expenditure was directly traceable to the salutary lessons taught the tax eaters by the Vigilantes whose protest was against the corrupt conduct of municipal affairs as well as against the laxity of the judiciary. A comparison of offices provided for by the charter of 1898, and those since created shows a decided increase.
In the light of later events the critic is forced to agree with George Bancroft, the historian of the United States, who dissented from the proposition that it was the Consolidation Act which gave the City of San Francisco the economical govern- ment which endured for a few years after 1856. But his observation that it was due to the people's party, or in other words to the selection of good men to hold office, needs the qualification that the organization was only able to make a record by pursuing a course which absolutely disregarded the necessities of a growing community. It was because of the strict application of the "hardscrabble" method that expenses were kept down. As soon as the people tired of bad streets and lack of improvements of all sorts, and went in for conveniences the restrictions of the Consolidation Act proved unavailing. Long before the adoption of the Constitution of 1879 there was incessant complaint that large sums were annually collected from the taxpayer and that there was nothing to show for them. If the city hall was pointed to it was merely for the purpose of illustrating the facility with which the money of the people could be expended without producing satisfactory results, and as has already been shown there was abundant ground for the charge made that there was waste and theft. With all its restrictions and limitations it was possible for a tax collector to make away with a considerable sum of the people's money, just as a similar official did in 1902. In short, so far as safeguarding
Futility of Charter Restrictions
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the treasury was concerned, there was very little improvement between 1850-56 and 1856-98, and for that matter between 1898-1912.
It took nineteen years for the people of San Francisco to make up their minds to abandon the Consolidation Act and when they finally did they were under no illusion of the sort that Hager labored under when he advocated giving cities of 100,000 or more inhabitants the privilege of framing a freeholder's charter. They had rejected several instruments, none of which, however, provided that simple and inexpensive form of government which the author of the charter section in the constitution thought was demanded. When the organic act submitted in 1898 was finally presented the array of officials elective and appointive for which it provided was as formidable as the most thoroughgoing expansionist could desire. There were to be elected a board of supervisors, a county clerk, a sheriff, recorder, assessor, auditor, treasurer, district attorney, tax collector, city attorney, public administrator and superior judges and justices of the peace. The list shows no abridgment which was not fully offset by the appointive boards and commissions created, none of which were particularly new, but all of which represented ampli- fication and in some instances the substitution of special officials in the place of bodies which had acted in an ex officio capacity. These consisted of the following: board of public works, fire commissioners, board of health, election commissioners, police commissioners, park commissioners, board of education and civil service com- missioner.
The charter which was ratified by a vote of the people May 26, 1898, had to be approved by the legislature and was not in operation until January 8, 1900. Since that time it has been amended in many particulars and has been construed by the courts. Although it was clearly intended by the framers of the constitution to grant the city adopting a freeholder's charter the completest control of their local affairs the fact that San Francisco was still under the operation of the gen- eral laws of the state, and that some of its officials performed the dual duties of county and city officials, caused confusion at times until by amendment and inter- pretation their relations were defined. In a decision rendered in the case of Kahn v. Sutro, the court had illustrated the distinction between city and county officers. The mayor, the city and county attorney, superintendents of public streets, high- ways and squares, the school directors, treasurer, auditor, tax collector, surveyor and supervisors were distinguished as municipal rather than county officers, while the district attorney, sheriff, county clerk, county recorder, coroner, public ad- ministrator, assessor and superintendent of public schools were held to be county officers.
As the terms of the municipal officers and county officers were not of equal length complications ensued. Under the freeholder's charter, the mayor, the city attorney, the school directors, treasurer, auditor, tax collector, board of public works were solely municipal, while the remainder of the list were county officials and as such were elected for a longer term than the former. This difficulty was finally overcome by the City taking over the duties and obligations of a county of the state. This left the City the power to decide the manner and method of electing or appointing the necessary officers to fulfill these duties and their compensation. The settlement of this matter, which was a vexed one for a time, gave the City the local autonomy it so earnestly desired, but the claim that economies were
A More Expensive Form of Government
Dual System Not Done Away With
City Secures Local Autonomy
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effected by the assumption of control is not borne out by the salary lists of the City.
"The City Beautiful" Idea in 1900
Blundering Attempt to Fix Interest Rate
As a matter of fact economy had ceased to be the prime consideration in San Francisco before the adoption of the charter of 1898. Before the new organic law went into operation on the 8th of January, 1900, the City had given a decided exhibition of its intention to go in for a comprehensive system of improvements. "The City Beautiful" idea had found lodgment in the public mind and expressed itself at an election held in 1899 at which several civic improvements were voted for which involved in the aggregate an expenditure of $18,000,000. One of these projects was known as the Park Panhandle and provided for the extension by a parked boulevard of the approach to the people's pleasure ground which would terminate at Van Ness avenue at a point practically in the heart of the City. A new hospital and school houses were also included in the list of schemes submitted to the electors. There was a vigorous discussion of the merits of the projects, especially that relating to the extension of the pan handle, and the cautious ex- pressed the fear that there was a job involved. But in spite of the apparent lively interest, and notwithstanding the fact that an affirmative vote for the propositions would amount to a reversal of a policy steadily adhered to for over forty years only 29,972 votes were cast at the election. A year later at the general election when the selection of officials was the main question over 66,000 voters went to the polls, and expressed their personal preferences.
Owing to a blunder made by the freeholders in framing the charter whose pro- visions would govern the emission of the bonds a rate of interest was arbitrarily fixed, and the securities were to be sold at not less than par. The result of these restrictions was to make the marketing of the bonds impossible. During some years previous to the adoption of the charter interest rates had been steadily de- clining throughout the world, and the framers of the instrument had become imbued with the idea that the condition was to be permanent. This belief, coupled with the extreme cautiousness engendered by years of fancied observation of the neces- sity of imposing restrictions on the City's administrators, caused the freeholders to reject the experience of other cities and to disregard the suggestions of common sense and to assume that the lenders of money could be dictated to by a municipality. The fact was overlooked that the competition of capital, if the bonds were sold to the highest bidder, would properly adjust the interest rate. The impossible was demanded and the bonds could not be sold. Subsequent experience developed that the mistake was not without its compensating advantages, for while the people were perfectly willing to expend $18,000,000 for the purposes outlined in the bond proposals for which they voted affirmatively, when Ruef's party came to power there was less confidence in the wisdom of the movement for improvements. It should be added, however, that so far as the most important of the proposed expenditures was concerned, that relating to the Park Panhandle extension, a decision of the courts, which found informalities in the measure as voted upon, prevented the carrying out of that scheme.
Change In Plans of New City Hall
It is not to be supposed that the changed attitude toward bonded indebtedness came about in the twinkling of an eye. There had been much talk about the uneconomic method adopted in the construction of the city hall, the expenditure upon which had very greatly exceeded the original estimates. It had been fre- quently pointed out that the "pay as you go" plan was responsible not only for the
IL SCHILLER
Thomas Starr King Memorial
Statue of Father Junipero Serra
Goethe and Schiller Monument
Francis Scott Key Monument
Statue of General Henry W. Halleck MONUMENTS IN GOLDEN GATE PARK
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interminable delay in the building of the municipal edifice, but that it prevented the economies which are possible when a work is properly mapped out and con- tinuously prosecuted. These criticisms were revived with vigor in 1894, when contracts were let for the building of a dome. It was pointed out that such a structure would be out of harmony with the remainder of the building, but criticisms of this character had little effect. The hall had been in process of building for twenty-three years, and its cost had exceeded several millions and there was now a burning desire to get it finished in some fashion. The original plans of the architect had long been lost sight of, or were modified because it would have been too expensive to carry them out. A mansard roof was to have surmounted the main structure, but it was cut out on the ground that it would prove too great a fire menace, and there were other changes which deprived the building of all claims to harmony, and the critics cheerfully abandoned the tall tower and ac- cepted the circular innovation in its stead, and the people acquiesced, only urging that the work be rushed to completion.
About the time this restiveness was displaying itself there was formed an organization which contributed greatly to the growth of a new opinion respecting the functions of a municipal government and laid the foundation of the sentiment which finally overthrew the laissez faire policy that had endured for nearly forty years. On the 13th of April, 1894, forty-seven merchants met in the Palace hotel to discuss the needs of the City and the possibility of bringing some effective aid from the outside toward the bettering of municipal government. At this meeting the Merchants' Association came into existence, its avowed object being politely stated to be "the practical improvement of the City of San Francisco," and its work was "to be the doing of those things which were not being done because there was no one in particular to look after them." That it had a more far reaching object is disclosed by the first step taken by the organization. It resolved to give an object lesson in the cleaning of streets. Obviously there was some one par- ticularly chosen by the people to keep the streets clean, and money was appropriated for that purpose; there was a superintendent of streets, and several hundred thou- sand dollars were annually expended to keep them in order. Consequently the Merchants' Association was not undertaking a new line of work; it simply invaded the field of the tax waster to show what could be done if affairs were properly managed.
The object lesson served one purpose. It created a desire for better and cleaner streets. The Merchants' Association went about the job intelligently, and succeeded in showing what could be done. At the same time its course suf- ficed to emphasize the ineffectiveness of municipal methods and to clearly indi- cate the source of trouble. Subscriptions were made by merchants along the principal streets, and with the sum thus obtained men were hired to clean the thoroughfares by the block system which had not been employed theretofore in San Francisco. The success achieved was not due so much to the change of methods, as to the fact that the merchants took care to hire men who were willing to work, whereas previously those engaged were usually selected with reference to the part they had taken in advancing the personal political fortunes of the superintendent of streets or of other city officials. But the success achieved was due in a large degree by the fact that the wages paid were not high enough to tempt political loafers.
Formation of Merchants' Association
An Object Lesson in Street Cleaning
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Ineffective- ness Does Not Deter Advocates of Municipal Ownership
The experiment was a success, however, and during several years the municipal authorities, after the initial object lesson which lasted twelve months, permitted the merchants to usurp their function and accepted and followed the specifications prepared by the association. It is extraordinary in view of the fact that the activities of the Merchants' Association were all of a nature to emphasize the inef- ficiency of the municipal authorities, and to suggest that the initiative would have to come from some other source if progress was to be made, that concurrently with its almost constant effort to introduce improvements, and while it was making inno- vations which public officials under our system would never think of proposing, and which if proposed by them would have no chance of being carried out, there grew up a sentiment in favor of public ownership, and a further enlargement of the sphere of the ineffectives. A recital of the claims made for the Merchants' Association constitutes an indictment against the American municipal method which should have warned those who so zealously entered upon the scheme of public ownership and operation of utilities, that the step would be beset with enormous difficulties which would have to be overcome by completely altering the attitude of the people on the subject of the expenditure of moneys raised by taxation before the optimistic promises of the departure from individualism could be realized.
Activities of Merchants' Association
For forty years or more the men regularly elected to office, whether good, bad or indifferent, had contented themselves and satisfied the community by simply doing what was required of them. The highest encomium bestowed upon a retiring official during the period was embodied in the admission that he had not abused his position, or that he had prevented others from doing so. As soon as the merchants got to work they began doing novel things which might just as well have been done by the salaried servants of the people. For instance it occurred to the directing spirit of the association that the park being in need of a fertiliz- ing element it would be a good plan to spread the street sweepings upon the bare places. The idea was put into execution; the street car lines were persuaded to haul the stuff to the required spots and the reclamation of a good many acres resulted, thus adding to the beauty and attractiveness of the pleasure ground. Years after the superiority of electricty had been recognized elsewhere the super- visors continued to make contracts with the Gas Company for the supply of the inferior illuminant until a subscription of $15,000 was raised and a number of electric lamps were introduced to prove that they served the purpose better. The rest of the country had made successful experiments with asphaltum pavements, but San Francisco's legislative body refused to encourage the use of any other material than the basalt block until the association directed its efforts to creating a sentiment in favor of smooth and presentable appearing streets. The public service corporations were permitted to make the streets unsafe and unsightly with poles and overhead wires until under pressure the supervisors passed an ordinance compelling wires to be laid underground in the business districts. The practice of stretching advertising banners across the streets, and the defacing of the side- walks with signs went on unchecked until the association acted, and it was at the instance of that organization, and not until after it had at the expense of its mem- bership given a practical exhibition of the value of isles of safety on Market street, that the latter were introduced.
Revolt Against Dollar Limit
These activities and others which could be recited are dwelt upon to emphasize the assertion that there was plenty of latent public spirit which was easily aroused,
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and that it began to assert itself when the people shook off the idea which had taken possession of narrow minded men that the only object in life is to dodge the tax gatherer. With the advent of the Merchants' Association, whose member- ship extended rapidly, and had reached nearly fifteen hundred at the time of the fire of 1906, the hostility to smooth pavements disappeared, and under its influence citizens were becoming sensitive to ridicule, and were no longer willing to submit to the indignity of having corporation moonlight impose upon them. The petty economy of shutting off the street lights on nights when the almanac said the moon should be shining was abandoned, and the wretched bungling which had characterized the making of the budget ceased to the extent at least of guarding against the evil of plunging the City in darkness towards the end of the fiscal year because of want of funds. The people were becoming educated to the fact that many things which the "silurian" spirit had opposed were really desirable, and that the City would be compelled to provide them even if the dollar limit had to be exceeded.
The necessity of such an organization as the Merchants' Association was made apparent by the fruitlessness of repeated earlier efforts to promote an interest in the subject of public improvements. Sporadic attempts had been made to that end under other auspices, but it required constant prodding to lift the people out of the slough of satisfaction into which they had fallen through contemplation of the undoubted advantages of the port, which many fancied would force prosperous conditions in spite of bad management. There were numerous mass meetings, some of them under the auspices of influential bodies to urge public improvements. A large meeting called at the instance of the Mechanics' institute was held at the Grand opera house in June, 1887, which was addressed by numerous speakers all of whom pointed out the necessity of abandoning the too conservative attitude of the past and going in for a policy which would make the City attractive. The meeting was a representative one in every particular, and many of those on the platform were large property holders. The movement was assisted also by the district improvement clubs which had been called into existence by the desire for neighborhood improvement. The first of these appears to have been the Point Lobos Improvement Club, which was organized in 1885. In 1885 the Holly Park Improvement Club was formed and the North Central Association came into exist- ence the same year as that which witnessed the advent of the Merchants' Associa- tion. A year later the Sunset Improvement Club was organized. All of these bodies interested themselves more or less in the movement to secure a new charter. Their primary object, of course, was to promote the development of the particular section in which they were formed, but even at this early date their memberships evinced a keen appreciation of the value of solidarity in promoting the public wel- fare, and could always be depended upon to work together when a plan for the general benefit was advanced. The Merchants' Association while not directly affiliated with these improvement clubs worked in harmony with them and through the sentiment produced by united action the long desired charter was finally secured.
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