USA > California > San Francisco County > San Francisco > San Francisco, a history of the Pacific coast metropolis, Volume II > Part 50
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Law and Order Reign
Crime in City and Country
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entered the Savings Union bank at Market and Fell streets, and on the refusal of the cashier to hand over the money in the till shot and killed him, but being disabled by a splinter of a pane of glass smashed by a bullet fired at him by a clerk he was captured and hanged.
Chinese Crimes and Criminals
There was one form of crime in San Francisco during the Eighties and Nine- ties of which, until comparatively recently, the Pacific coast metropolis had a practical monopoly. The presence of large numbers of Chinese made the City familiar with the activities of a class of criminals known as "highbinders." Curi- ously enough the appellation so much in vogue in San Francisco is said to have been first applied by a New York policeman to designate a Chinese hoodlum. These men are little else than professional blackmailers, and are often employed by assumedly reputable Chinese to work out their grudges or carry on their feuds. They thrive by extortion, being feared by the men who use them, and who for a half a century by their disregard of American law have created conditions in the Chinese quarter which the ordinary processes of the law are unable to reach.
The career of Fong Chong, known as Little Pcte, who organized a society of men of the criminal class called the Gi Sin Seer illustrates the difficulties ex- perienced by the police of San Francisco in dealing with crime in Chinatown during this period. His success in blackmailing his fellow countrymen through the instrumentality of the Gi Sin Seer stimulated the formation of a rival known as the Bo Sin Seer whose members devoted a good deal of their time to attempts to get rid of Little Pete, who was so beset that he deemed it advisable to hire a body guard named Lee Chuck. In July, 1886, Chuck and a rival highbinder met on the corner of Spofford alley and Washington streets and Chuck killed his man and tried to shoot the detectives who sought to arrest him. When Chuck was being tred for the murder of the Bo Sin Seer man Little Pete sought to bribe the officer who made the arrest to testify falsely, and was arrested. He procured bail, and made an effort to bribe a juror who was sitting in the Chuck case. On February 4, 1887, Chuck was found guilty and sentenced to death, but Little Pete had learned something else about American laws than the fact that they could in most cases be evaded with facility by his countrymen. He secured able counsel for his bodyguard and by that means procured three trials for him. Chuck was finally sentenced to fifty years imprisonment and in February, 1892, was removed from San Quentin to Agnews insane asylum where he remained until May 30, 1904, when Governor Pardee promised to pardon him if he was deported. The steamship companies, however, refused to carry him back to his native land so he was remanded to Agnews, the prison authorities pronouncing him insane.
Little Pete himself was tried for jury bribing in August, 1887, and convicted. He served five years in San Quentin, but that by no means terminated his career. In the early part of March, 1896, he organized a conspiracy by which the fre- quenters of the race track were swindled out of large sums daily. With the assistance of jockeys, stablemen and others connected with the race track the horses which were to win were decided upon, and Little Pete and his confederates "cleaned up" large sums daily. The Chinese was in the habit of betting as much as $6,000 a day. The trick was not discovered until the gang had won about $100,000. Little Pete during the period after his release from San Quentin felt himself in as much danger from his countrymen as before his incarceration, and procured a white man to act as his body guard.
"Little Pete" Emulates "Ah Sin's" Exploits
Career of "Little Pete"
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On the 24th of Jannary, 1897, Little Pete relaxed his vigilance to the extent of sending his guardian on an errand while he was under the hands of a barber in a shop on Washington street. As soon as he was alone two Chinese entered and killed him as he sat in the chair. Suspects were arrested, but owing to the terrorism of the tong system of reprisal no conviction could be obtained. Little Pete's funeral was an elaborate affair, all Chinatown uniting to do him honor. The cortege was preceded to the cemetery by an American band, and flowers were sent by Americans. On this occasion the big dragon was used, and thus the Chinese of San Francisco testified their appreciation of the cunning of one of their conntrymen, and incidentally displayed their fear of further evil conse- quences if they refrained from showing proper respect to the remains of the departed. It should be added that a Chinese known as Big Jim, a leader of a rival tong, the See Yups, deemed it prudent to flee to China as he felt sure that he would be the next victim of the feud, being suspected of encompassing the death of Little Pete.
The evil results of permitting the Chinese to take the law into their own hands did not end with the harm they wrought each other. Prudence or some other mo- tive restrained the worst of the highbinders from committing depredations on whites, but they inflicted injuries fully as serious as those involved in the com- mission of bodily harm. In short, for many years they systematically corrupted the police of the City, many of them being liberally bribed to shut their eyes to the infractions of the laws by the Chinese. At various times there were disclosures which made it perfectly clear that the conductors of gambling dens and houses of prostitution in "Chinatown" paid regular snms to the police to secure immunity from molestation. But the difficulty of proving what everyone knew to be the case seemed insuperable. The scandals were frequent, and were by no means confined to the period while Ruef and Schmitz were administering the affairs of the City. It was a festering sore years before the workingmen came to power and it has not been healed since the fire; it probably never will be until the safe- guards intended to protect innocent men cannot be invoked to defeat the ends of justice. Madame Roland's protest against the perpetration of crimes commit- ted under the pretense that they are done to secure human liberty seems to apply to the situation. Under the theory of protecting good men who have nothing to fear from the law the criminal and vicious practice their arts in safety and flourish.
The courts of San Francisco during the period showed no greater degree of laxity or efficiency at one time than another. There were bad judges and good judges; there were weak and inefficient juries, and there were juries whose ac- tions inclined men to believe that the system of "twelve men good and true" reaching a proper verdict had not entirely lost its usefulness. It is worth noting that if the people believed that their courts were corrupt during this period they refused to avail themselves of the remedy which they had at their command. A list of the occupants of the bench at the close of 1905 shows that many of them had occupied their positions for years, and had been elected and reelected. For nearly a quarter of a century the practice of choosing judges for partisan reasons had wholly ceased. While the machinery of the political parties was used to put the names of candidates before the electors, party lines were absolutely dis- regarded by the press and the voter. Whether the result was wholly satisfactory the student of sociology is as yet unable to decide, and the practical every day
Little Pete's Death and Funeral
Chinese Cor- rupt Police Force
Administra- tion of the Law
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man who observes the facility with which men obtain and retain positions con- ferred by the electorate is equally undetermined. He only knows that in San Francisco the daily press has pointed out the looseness of the administration of justice in certain courts, and that when the time comes for remedying the evils complained of a majority of the voters tacitly indorse the evildoers by voting to continue them in power. This was particularly true of the police and inferior courts during the period. Exposures of shyster methods and abuse of the bail bond system have proved unavailing and give little promise that the "recall" will ever be exercised except in response to a gust of popular passion.
CHAPTER LXIII
THE GREAT DISASTER AND CONFLAGRATION OF APRIL, 1906
CONDITION OF THE CITY ON THE EVE OF THE EARTHQUAKE-SAN FRANCISCO ON TOP OF THE WAVE OF PROSPERITY-THE WORKINGMEN'S PARTY AND BOSS RUEF IN POWER-COMMERCE AND MORALS MIXED-BUILDINGS BEFORE THE FIRE-OPPOSI- TION TO EXTENSION OF FIRE LIMITS-LAST PERFORMANCE IN THE GRAND OPERA HOUSE-NO WARNING OF IMPENDING DANGER-EFFECTS OF THE EARTHQUAKE- THE THREE DAYS' CONFLAGRATION-MUCH PROPERTY UNNECESSARILY SACRIFICED -EXPLOSIVES TIMIDLY AND UNSKILFULLY USED-ORGANIZATION OF CITIZENS COM- MITTEE OF FIFTY-CIRCULATION OF WILD RUMORS-COMPOSITION OF THE COM- MITTEE OF FIFTY-RIGID PRECAUTIONS ADOPTED BY THE MILITARY-FOOD IN GREAT DEMAND-RELIEF POURS IN FROM ALL POINTS-THE UPLIFT WORK OF THE DAILY PRESS-FILLMORE STREET BECOMES CENTER OF ACTIVITY-REJOICING OVER RE- SUMPTION OF STREET CAR TRAVEL-OVERHEAD TROLLEY PERMIT FOR MARKET STREET GRANTED-CHIMNEY INSPECTION-AREA OF THE BURNED DISTRICT-NO- TABLE ESCAPES FROM THE FLAMES-INVESTIGATION BY UNITED STATES GEOLOGICAL SURVEY-BUILDING TO GUARD AGAINST TREMORS-FAILURE OF WATER SUPPLY-THE EXODUS FROM THE CITY-RELIEF WORK OF THE SOUTHERN PACIFIC.
HE year 1906 opened with all the indications pointing to a continuance of the material prosperity which had begun to manifest itself after 1896. There had been satisfactory progress during several years, except in manufacturing which failed to increase with the growth of the City, but A SEAL 0 F SAN FR. the commerce of the port was expanding and the merchants were doing a big business which was reflected in the reports of the clearings of the city banks which showed more than a hundred per cent gain over those of 1896. The state was attracting large numbers of immigrants who were settling on the lands formerly embraced in big ranches, which were being cut up and disposed of in small tracts, and the occupants of the latter were making their presence felt by a constant enlargement of the output of California's specialized products which were shipped to the East and to Europe in ever grow- ing qualities. The development of the oil industry which was attaining great proportions, and the activity displayed in the hydroelectric field were inspiring a renewal of the dormant belief that San Francisco was destined to be a great manu- facturing center, if not at once, then in the near future when the state should be filled with a large enough consuming population to enable those engaging in individ- nal enterprises involving the use of machinery, to produce on a scale sufficiently
Condition of City on Eve of the Big Fire
819
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great to permit them to compete on favorable terms with the manufacturers of the Atlantic seaboard, and of the Middle West, which had in its turn become a formidable rival of the old established centers of production.
The interior press had ceased to gibe San Franciscans for taking things easily, and resting too securely on the assumption that the situation of their port made them commercially impregnable. Comparisons of the growth of Los Angeles and San Francisco were less frequent than at an earlier date, and it was beginning to dawn on the people of the City as well as on their critics, that the prosperity of one community or section of the state is not at the expense of another, but that progress was apt to be mutually stimulating. It would have been extraor- dinary if the observant had failed to note this, for the evidence was overwhelm- ing that the remarkable advances of the region below the Tehachapi, which at one time was an entirely negligible factor in the state's development, was contributing to the growth of the metropolis. A few years earlier a single daily train over the one line operated by the Southern Pacific sufficed to carry all the passengers traveling between Los Angeles and San Francisco, and an inconsiderable number of freight cars transported the products exchanged between the two cities. At the opening of 1906 there were two lines between San Francisco and Los Angeles, one traversing the great interior valley, the other running through the picturesque and interesting coast-line region. The Santa Fe had also effected an entrance into the city by the acquisition of the San Joaquin valley road and a trackage arrangement with the Southern Pacific. In addition to these facilities the one or two small steamers, which formerly plied between the port of San Francisco and San Pedro had been supplemented by large modern vessels. Hundreds of people were passing to and fro by means of these multiplied facilities where for- merly the number was insignificant, and goods of all kinds were moving in great quantities, the volume constantly increasing. An official of one of the railways remarking upon the marvelous transformation effected by the influx of immi- grants into the region south of the Tehachapi declared that in the opening months of 1906 more freight was moved between the two cities in one day than had formerly been carried in six months.
It is doubtful, however, whether these causes were as potent in changing the attitude of the critics who insisted that San Francisco suffered because she was the victim of a disposition to hide her light under a bushel, as the observed fact that the City was actually "booming." The conservatism of her people could not disguise what was being made apparent in every way. There was no beating of tom toms; if anything there was a strong inclination toward pessimism which asserted itself in predictions that the wretched municipal government presaged by the election of a board of supervisors, of whom their boss said they were so greedy of plunder that they would "eat the paint off of a house" would bring dis- aster, but the recorded facts seemed to dissipate all fear that even such a gang could give the City a setback. Schmitz had been elected a third time in No- vember, 1905, and it could no longer be asserted that his success was due to division in the ranks of his opponents for the cold figures of the election returns showed that he had a clean majority over the combined vote of his democratic and republican opponents. It was intimated that this result was achieved by manipu- lation of the voting machines which were used for the first time in a municipal election in San Francisco, but the undisguised astonishment of Abe Ruef when
A Boom that Nothing Could Hinder
Rivalry Stim- ulates San Francisco's Growth
COAL
PIER
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REMOVAL OF DEBRIS BY THE WATER ROUTE
ELECTRA
ELECTRIC AND STEAM POWER EMPLOYED TO REMOVE DEBRIS BY RAIL
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he found that he had elected a solid board of supervisors composed of his creatures, which found expression in the above quoted exclamation, disputes a charge which was never supported by evidence of any sort.
The truth of the matter has been made obscure by prejudice and a desire to find an excuse for a serious blunder. There is no doubt that the third election of Schmitz, and the election of a board of supervisors composed of men who were selected by Ruef, more for the purpose of completing his ticket than with the hope of electing them, was due to a combination of circumstances in which the solidarity of the workingmen was only one factor. Alone, the latter could not have carried the day, but they were reinforced by the class discontented with the way things had been conducted in the past, and by the growing army of disrepu- tables lured to the City by its increasing prosperity, and by the laxity of the municipal government and the police who permitted them to run things with a high hand. The City was overcrowded with grog shops, and little or no effort was made to restrain the gambling propensity which asserted itself almost as strongly as in early days, but did not flaunt itself in the open. Prize fights fraudulently termed "boxing contests," were licensed, and these demoralizing exhibitions were attended by men moving in the front rank of respectability who had no hesita- tion about being seen seated side by side with thieves and habitues of the under- world. The person who had a moderate acquaintance with politicians and men in office could easily at such a show pick out members of the board of supervisors who were present as interested spectators, being in the enjoyment of compli- mentary tickets entitling them to ringside places, conferred on them because of the obliging disposition shown hy them in the giving of permits. The number of men who gained their living through their connection with these so called sporting exhibitions, and the bookmakers and hangers on of all kinds at the daily races constituted a considerable part of the boss' backing, which was still further augmented by the dissolute creatures who prey on fallen women.
If these people, and the practices referred to, had suddenly been called into existence there might be plausible ground for the too common assumption that the workingmen's party was responsible for the creation of the condition described. But this sort of looseness was not unknown to San Francisco before the great fire. Although the upheaval which disclosed the wretched state of affairs did not take place until after that event, there is no doubt that things were in a bad way before its occurrence. Years before 1906 the press of San Francisco had pointed out the evil consequences flowing from the license accorded the disrepu- table elements. The fact that office holders were abusing their positions by ac- cepting bribes was proclaimed so frequently, and with such circumstantiality that the community was permeated with the belief that most men sought position solely for illicit purposes. Charges were made so often, and were so little heeded that in course of time the accused were able to turn on their accusers and actually succeeded in minimizing the force of exposures by retorting that they were "news- paper lies." In the campaign of 1905 which resulted in the election of Schmitz, a part of the press devoted itself to showing that the object of Ruef was to gain control with the view of redeeming his promise of making San Francisco "a wide open town." The methods of the boss were freely exposed, and predictions of what would result in the event of the success of the boss, all of which were realized, were made on the stump and in the columns of newspapers. They proved un-
Conditions that Made Ruef's Suc- cess Possible
Prevalence of Queer Eco- nomic Ideas
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availing because the workingmen, unmindful of any other object than the main- tenance of the solidarity of their unions, in common with a part of the mercan- tile community, stood by the boss. These mistaken people foolishly attributed the undoubted material advance of San Francisco to the fact that no restraint was placed on the vicious and degraded elements. They were unable to perceive that the City was profiting through the development of the resources of the in- terior, and that it was sharing in the prosperity which was general throughout the United States, and that the good times were in no wise due to local political causes.
Outsiders Hold up Ruef's Hands
The easy acquiescence in the result showed conclusively that reformation move- ments are not effectively pursued except during periods of adversity. When the triumph of Ruef and Schmitz was made known by the speedy assemblage of the machine recorded and counted vote there was an enormous parade of their ad- herents. As they marched by the "Chronicle" office they assailed the paper with continuous groans, and abusive epithets; a little later the tower surmounting the building on the corner of Market, Geary and Kearny streets was destroyed by fire. The disaster was purely accidental, but it was attributed by some to the vengefulness of the supporters of Schmitz and the workingmen's party ticket. That incident was, perhaps, the only one to excite general interest after the an- nouncement of the success of Ruef until April, 1906. In the intervening five months the press had much to say about what was going on, but their accusations were met with the shrugs of the indifferent, and the retort that the charges were news- paper lies. The interior critics devoted themselves for a time to demonstrating that the press of San Francisco was without influence, inferentially conveying the impression that the antagonism of the defeated element in the City was wholly inspired by hatred of trades unionism. That much of the opposition was due to the belief that the course pursued by the unions was calculated to injure the City was unquestionably true, but it exhibited shortsightedness on the part of as- sumedly disinterested outsiders to minimize the importance of the protest against what came to be called grafting, and it doubtless had a tendency to encourage Ruef to extend his operations, now that he had become master of the situation, and was in a position to deal with leading citizens who were anxious to obtain fresh privileges or to have extended those previously enjoyed by them.
That Ruef and his greedy crew of supervisors, backed by the reelected mayor, were actively benefiting by the authority conferred upon them by a majority of their fellow citizens was no secret during the three and a half months inter- vening between the advent of the new administration and the eventful April 18, 1906. The community, however, took but a perfunctory interest in the "news- paper lies," and hardly devoted a serious thought to the struggle to obtain fran- chises which the growing prosperity of the City had set on foot. The charge that a group of men headed by Claus Spreckels were seeking the privilege of provid- ing San Francisco with a rival traction system excited only a languid attention, and the assumption that they were dickering with Ruef aroused no hostile com- ment. What little feeling developed seemed to be chiefly due to the activities of the advocates of municipal ownership who made common cause with Spreckels, Phelan and others in an agitation against the extension of the trolley system and in favor of underground conduits for street railways. Few people asked just how the rivalry with the United Railroads would be set in motion; all they cared
Hostility Against the United Railroads
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for apparently was to see rivalry brought about. Friends of the United Rail- roads, and enemies of the group whose intention of building a rival system was proclaimed, expressed doubts concerning the designs of the proponents of the opposition system, and intimated that it was something in the nature of an at- tempt to obtain control of a valuable property which the capitalists of the City had allowed to pass out of their possession, and the more virulent averred that the movement had many of the characteristics which had previously attended large financial deals of the senior Spreckels.
The community, however, was too engrossed with its commercial and other affairs to pay much attention to anything but its prosperity. During the first six months of 1905 the clearings of the San Francisco banks aggregated $855,- 915,002; in the last half of the year they had swollen to $978,634,785, an in- crease of $122,719,785 over the first six months. The total for the year exceeded that of ten years earlier by more than $1,100,000,000, the aggregate rising from $683,229,599 in 1896 to $1,834,549,788 in 1905. Real estate speculation and dealings, and building operations exhibited extraordinary activity. The sales of realty which amounted to only $10,747,102 in 1898 were seven times as great in 1905, aggregating $74,926,065; and construction expenditures rose during the same period from $3,490,603 to $20,111,861. The opening months of 1906 prom- ised that business would surpass in every particular that of the preceding year. New buildings were projected and enterprises of various sorts were being mooted. San Franciscans under the stimulating influence of their own success were inter- esting themselves in projects to advance the fortunes of the interior, and the talk of a big city was crystallizing rapidly into a Greater San Francisco movement. The proposition to hold an exposition on the completion of the Panama Canal, which had been suggested in 1905, and was at first regarded as an enterprise too large for a city situated a couple of thousand miles distant from the populous center of the country, began to seem easy of accomplishment and was being seri- ously discussed.
The only fly in the ointment was the uneasy feeling created by the illiberal criticism of the Eastern press whose editors insisted upon regarding San Francisco as a community given over as a prey to trades unionism in its worst form, and who freely predicted all sorts of evils as a consequence of the surrender of the people to the domination of a single class. Many San Franciscans shared the view freely expressed at the East, that the effect of the ascendancy of the labor element in politics would be to drive out capital; as for attracting it while the condition existed the suggestion that it might be done was derided. Whatever comment was passed on the stories concerning graft which were printed in the San Francisco papers was usually linked with the assumption that it was inseparable from the admin- istration of affairs by men untrained in the management of big enterprises, and who were supposed to have no other purpose to subserve than to advance their fortunes at the expense of property owners who had to meet the tax bill. San Franciscans were commercially enough inclined to be influenced by criticisms which seemed to menace the growth of the City, and the expansion of their trade, but unfortunately the force of arguments and the fear that might have been in- spired by predictions of evil material results were dissipated by observation of the undoubted fact that at no time in its history had the City ever been more flourishing and the outlook for its expansion brighter.
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