Joaquin valleys and the driving of most of the country population to San Francisco. Within a week after the legislature convened, the city of Sacramento was almost completely submerged and communication with the capitol and from street to street and from house to house could only be maintained with boats. Nearly the entire country as far as the eye could reach north and south and all the way to the Coast Range of mountains on the west was a sea of water. Here and there the roofs of houses or elevations of land stuck out; but otherwise it was hard to point out any special locality. The course of the Sacramento river could only be told by the tops of the trees that grew along its banks. On January 11, a joint resolution was moved and adopted in the senate to adjourn the legislature to San Francisco; and in the meanwhile it was resolved that the sergeant-at-arms should procure one or more boats for transportation of members and attachés of the senate and, with an evident eye to what might otherwise be expected of ordinary boatmen, arrange the price to be paid per hour before services were rendered. The assembly at first refused to concur in the resolution for adjournment, but like the senate authorized its sergeant-at-arms to hire the necessary boats to carry members to and from the capitol. But a few days afterwards, as the rains still continued and the waters rose higher and higher, Frank M. Pixley, the new attorney-general, having in the meanwhile given his opinion that the legislature might legally adjourn to any other place, the resolution was adopted by the assembly also, and the time for meeting in San Francisco fixed for Friday, January 24.'

In accordance with the resolution so adopted, the legislature met in the Merchants' Exchange building on the northeast corner of Washington and Battery streets, San Francisco, on January 24. It required a few days to get things in running order; but, as soon as the new quarters were properly arranged, the work of the session went forward with great activity. Barstow, in his inaugural as speaker of the assembly, had called attention to the fact that the sitting of the legislature cost the people of California over a thousand dollars per day and that there was 'Senate Journal, 1862, 105, 108, 124; Assembly Journal, 1862, 104, 107, 115, 120, 125, 126.

no good reason why it should not get through its labor in less than sixty days. But for various reasons the session lasted till the middle of May. One of the first important steps taken was a concurrent resolution adopted on January 29, instructing the governor to give notice by telegraph to the United States secretary of the treasury that the state of California would assume and pay the direct tax of a little over a quarter of a million of dollars apportioned by congress for meeting the interest on the public debt. Though the majority of the houses was not Republican, it was very strongly Union, and Union measures prevailed. Even before the removal to San Francisco, a motion to adjourn on January 8, in honor of the great Union president, Andrew Jackson, and his victory at New Orleans, was adopted in the senate. Almost immediately after the convening of the houses in the San Francisco Merchants' Exchange-and curiously enough on motion of the same William Holden who had moved the resolutions of censure against Broderick in 1859-a resolution was adopted to erect a staff and fly the American flag over the building. On February 22, the senate met in its chamber for the purpose of hearing Shafter, its president pro tempore, read Washington's farewell address. There were numerous propositions as to Union resolutions, varying less in spirit than in words; and the result was the adoption on April 4 of a renewed expression of the Union feeling, in favor of a thorough and vigorous prosecution of the war and unabated, unalterable and uncompromising hostility to treason and rebellion. Richard F. Perkins, Republican senator from San Francisco, went so far as to advocate as a war measure the confiscation and liberation of all the slaves of secessionists and the employment of them in the Union armies; but he was very far ahead of the times and was the only one that voted for his resolutions.

While the legislature agreed with Stanford on the Union and some other questions, the senate was not entirely in accord with him in reference to appointments. One of his first moves in this direction was an attempt to prevent the confirmation of Governor Downey's appointment of Thomas N. Cazneau as superintend1Senate Journal, 1862, 125; Assembly Journal, 1862, 9, 10; Stats. 1862, 598. 2 Senate Journal, 1862, 28, 130, 246, 307, 308; Stats. 1862, 603, 606.

ent of immigration. He sent in a message withdrawing the appointment; and the president of the senate decided that it was effective for that purpose; but the senate overruled the decision and confirmed Cazneau by the decisive majority of twenty-three to thirteen. One of his first direct nominations was that of R. P. Johnson as port-warden of San Francisco in place of Charles R. Street removed; but the senate, though it approved several other appointments to similar offices, refused to confirm Johnson. He then nominated Robert C. Waterman in place of Street; but again the senate refused to confirm. He next nominated Henry Bush, who was also rejected, and finally D. J. Staples, who was confirmed. Stanford's first veto was of a senate bill to transfer one hundred thousand dollars from the swamp land fund into the general fund for the purpose of paying members and attachés of the legislature. He said that it was doubtful whether the money, to which the swamp land fund had an exclusive right, could be repaid from the general fund on account of its being heavily in debt; and for that and other reasons he could not approve the bill. But as usual on such occasions, a governor's scruples are of little avail against the necessity of providing pay for legislators; and the act was promptly passed over the veto.2 In other instances his vetoes were sustained—among which was one disapproving a tax on consigned goods, and another disapproving an amendment to the statute of limitations, which would practically have deprived many owners of land of their rights.

Several very important bills, which produced marked effect in the state, were passed at the legislative session of 1862. One of these was an act to provide for the formation of corporations for the accumulation and investment of funds and savings. It was the original legislation, under which all the savings and loan. societies, that have proved among the most beneficent banking institutions of the country, organized. Another was an act to provide for issuing arms and accouterments to colleges and academies for the use of the youth and to prescribe the tactics to be used by them. It was under this act that the start was made

'Senate Journal, 1862, 119, 194-360.

*Senate Journal, 1862, 358; Stats. 1862, 56.

'Senate Journal, 1862, 642, 722-725.

Stats. 1862, 199.

in that very general military training of the rising generation, which has always since been of great interest and importance as a matter of state education. Another important bill, which produced a beneficial effect though it never became a law, was in reference to fortifying the harbor of San Francisco. On March 25, Governor Stanford had telegraphed to William H. Seward, United States secretary of state at Washington, asking on behalf of the legislature whether the foreign relations of the country were such as to make it necessary or expedient for California to take active measures to that end. Seward had answered that the aspect of foreign relations was pacific, but in the opinion of the president, while the civil war should actively continue, there might be foreign aggression; that no part of the United States. ought to be left exposed, and that one or two iron-clad steamers at San Francisco would insure its safety at small expense. Subsequently on April 28, the assembly committee on military affairs, to whom the subject had been referred, made an interesting report on the importance of fortifying San Francisco and presented a bill for the appropriation of five hundred thousand dollars for the construction of one or two iron-clad gun-boats. The proposition was to raise the money by the issuance of state bonds, with a reservation that if congress should provide the necessary defenses the bonds should not be placed on the market. The bill passed the assembly but was not reached in time for passage in the senate. The discussion, however, called attention to the subject; and the United States government undertook to provide defense by sending out several cruisers and dispatching an iron monitor in sections, which was afterwards put together and named the Comanche. But fortunately there never was any attack or any need of greater defense than San Francisco could have made with its own resources.

2

At the same legislative session of 1862 several important amendments to the state constitution, which had been proposed and adopted in 1861, were re-adopted so as to be ready for submission to a vote of the people at the general election of September 3, 1862. These were to make the sessions of the legislature 1 Stats. 1862, 483.

2 Assembly Journal, 1862, 535, 536, 674-676, 698.

biennial instead of annual; to elect assemblymen for two years instead of one, and senators for four years instead of two; to elect the governor and state officers for four years instead of two, and among them to elect, instead of appoint, a secretary of state; to increase the justices of the supreme court to five instead of three, and make them elective for terms of ten years at special judicial elections; to divide the state into fourteen judicial districts and as many more as two-thirds of the legislature might deem necessary, and elect judges thereof for terms of six years at the judicial elections; to organize a county court in each county and elect judges thereof for terms of four years at the judicial elections, who should act also as probate judges, except that the legislature might provide for a separate probate court and probate judge in San Francisco. There were some changes made in the jurisdiction of the various courts; and the old criminal courts of sessions with associate judges were abolished. In other words the composition of the judiciary of the state was entirely changed. And finally it was provided by another amendment that a state superintendent of public instruction should be elected at the judicial election and hold office for a term of four years. It may be added in this connection that these amendments were submitted to vote at the election of September, 1862, and adopted so as to become integral parts of the constitution. An amendment against special and local legislation in many enumerated cases and in all cases where general laws could be made applicable was adopted by the legislature of 1862; but it was rejected by the assembly of 1863; and the evil of special and local legislation, which by that time had begun to assume huge proportions, continued to grow larger and larger until finally destroyed by what may be called the very severe cure of the new constitution of 1879.1

Two matters of unusual character, which probably had to be gone through with though the subject of neither was worth the trouble, attracted much attention before the legislature of 1862 adjourned. The first was the conduct of Rev. Samuel B. Bell, a minister of the gospel, who had been elected to the assembly from Alameda county and appointed chairman of the judiciary Stats. 1862, 581-588; Assembly Journal, 1863, 654.