ings, right or wrong, had no idea of giving up; and, at his instance, a new bill was introduced and passed at the next session of the legislature, purporting to be for the indemnification of bona-fide settlers on the Yosemite grant, adding the name of Ira B. Folson to the other three and appropriating sixty thousand dollars to pay all the claims-which seem in the meanwhile, and after Hutchings' writ of error failed, to have been considerably reduced. Subsequently Hutchings, who had for decades talked and written about the great valley and assisted in making it famous, was for several years appointed guardian by the Yosemite commissioners, and still more recently the state legislature adopted a concurrent resolution intended to allow him the use of his old cabin and five acres of orchard around it for ten years.'

Railroad questions, which had absorbed so much attention in previous years, did not play much of a figure in the legislation of 1871-2. A bill, introduced in the assembly, was passed to extend the time for the Terminal Central Pacific Railroad Company to expend one hundred thousand dollars and comply with the conditions of the grant made to it in 1868 of submerged lands northwest of Yerba Buena Island. Booth, however, vetoed it; and, when the veto message came up in the assembly for consideration, it was sustained by a vote of seventy-four to one." Much of the time of the session was in fact taken up in considering Booth's numerous vetoes; and, as it proved, he was sustained in every case. One was a bill to establish a college at Santa Rosa in Sonoma county, which was objectionable as a special law prohibited by the constitution; three to allow leave of absence to the superintendents of common schools of Sutter and Shasta counties and the district attorney of Tehama county; another to authorize the Central Pacific Railroad Company to construct a bridge across the Sacramento river at Tehama without a draw: in all these, the vetoes were sustained unanimously. Vetoes were also sustained to a bill in relation to making taxdeeds evidence in Yuba county; to a bill to erect booms in Kings river, as not sufficiently guarded; to a bill for the relief of

2

1 Stats. 1873-4, 523; 1895, 449.

Assembly Journal, 1871-2, 798, 897-899.

3 Senate Journal, 1871–2, 420; Assembly Journal, 1871–2, 325, 334, 374, 484.

James R. Traverse to get back money paid on a forfeited recognizance; to another for the relief of purchasers of state lands; to two bills authorizing elections for relocating the county seats of Alpine and Kern counties; to another for the relief of the sheriff of Trinity county, who had been fined for violating a law of congress; to another to amend an act for the regulation of sailor boarding houses, and another to pay damages caused by cutting Second street through Rincon Hill in San Francisco.1 A veto of an act relating to railroads in Sonoma county was overruled by the assembly; but the senate laid the whole matter on the table.'

An interesting bill was introduced into the assembly at this session, by Obed Harvey of Sacramento, for the encouragement of the fine arts. It was referred to a special committee, consisting of himself, W. A. Aldrich and E. B. Mott, which reported that it should not pass for the reason that the treasury was not in condition to make suitable appropriations for the purposes designed. At the same time, they said they did not want to discourage the advancement of the fine arts. "We desire," they continued, "to see our capitol at some future time adorned with choice works of art, both in painting and sculpture, depicting scenes to which our people can point with pride as suggestive of the history and natural wealth and beauty of our state. In order that we may secure such, we recommend that a plan may be perfected by which the field may be open to competition and afford liberal encouragement to the California artists of ability." Mott had previously at the same session distinguished himself by another report. The Rev. Hiram Cummings had in some way managed to get himself appointed to the useless position of chaplain of the assembly, but did not receive the pay he seems to have considered his services worth. He therefore presented a petition asking "the same compensation that is paid to a copying clerk" or, in other words, eight dollars per day. The matter was referred to the committee on claims, of which Mott was chairman; and he reported back that "in view of the fact that all the members of the assembly were familiar with the facts of the 1 Assembly Journal, 1871–2, 586, 654, 677, 708, 896, 897, 912, 913, 921. * Assembly Journal, 1871-2, 575, 663; Senate Journal, 1871-2, 563.

case" and that his committee was "not exceptionally qualified to pass upon the efficiency and relative value of prayers,” it declined to make any recommendation.1

On April 1, 1872, the legislature finally adjourned. Thomas B. Shannon, the speaker of the assembly, in his valedictory remarks-constituting the swan-song of the session-said that some of the determinations of the houses had not seemed to meet with universal approbation; but he believed experience would demonstrate that no positively mischievous or oppressive measure had passed into statute law. On the other hand, he thought much good had been done. But there was one thing he could not help reprobating and that was the "selfish and narrow spirit which combined to defeat a new legislative apportionment." He evidently referred to the Democratic senate, which, he said, had manifested a disposition to cling to power by refusing to apportion the state in accordance with the great changes in wealth and population, that had taken place in the agricultural and commercial centers of the country, while in the other sections the reverse was the rule. He charged that such action was "to deny the right of representation;" that it was "the assertion of the right of taxation without representation;" that it was "indirectly the revival of colonial subordination;" that "no free and intelligent people will submit to so plain and palpable an outrage," and that "time will avenge this gross wrong.

"2

Such were the main legislation and legislative occurrences of the session of 1871-2; but several trials by jury, which took place in San Francisco about the same time, may be said to have made, or at least declared, more positive, more important and more far-reaching law in their special directions than the statutes. One was the so-called Hawes' will case. Horace Hawes, one of the acutest lawyers, most successful business men and ablest legislators the state has ever known-famous as prefect in 1849 and still more so as assemblyman in 1856 and senator in 1863-4 and 1865-6, and author of some of the most beneficent legislation of California including the San Francisco consolidation act and the state act for the registration of voters-died on March 1 Assembly Journal, 1871–2, 561, 594, 887.

2 Assembly Journal, 1871–2, 948.

12, 1871, at the age of fifty-eight years and in the possession of fortune estimated at over a million of dollars. He left a widow, whom he had married in 1858, after he had acquired his property, and two children, a son aged twelve and a daughter aged seven years. In October, 1870, he had made a deed of a valuable block of land in San Francisco in trust for the establishment and maintenance of a Chamber of Industry and in February, 1871, a deed of "Redwood farm" in San Mateo county and other property in trust for the establishment and maintenance on Redwood farm of an institution of learning-where law, medicine, agriculture, mechanic arts, commerce and the fine arts were to be taught in the most comprehensive manner possible-to be known as "Mont Eagle University." These two deeds comprehended the most of what he had; but they were filled with many reservations and conditions and, among others, some that rendered them subject to subsequent testamentary disposition. On March 2, he made his will-in substance confirming his deeds, but charging the so-called university property with inalienable annuities of twenty-five hundred dollars per annum to his wife for life, thirty-six hundred dollars per annum to his son after his majority for life, and one hundred dollars per month to his daughter until twenty years of age and afterwards three thousand dollars per annum for life. In addition, he made bequests of some fifteen or twenty thousand dollars to other relatives and gave to his son his library and personal property. It was evidently the will of a man who supposed he had a right to dispose of his own estate as he deemed proper, and who thought it would do more good as he devised it than to be spent otherwise.

Unfortunately for Hawes, he was a very outspoken man and quarreled with a great many persons, not excepting his wife, against whom he seems to have taken a particular dislike. He was excessively economical, in some respects parsimonious, and naturally felt a horror at the way in which he saw fortunes, earned by long and anxious care, dissipated by prodigal and spendthrift heirs and especially by parasites that hung round them. Though polite and gentlemanly with gentlemen, he often used language more forcible than elegant of those with whom he

33 VOL. IV.

quarreled and particularly of those who he thought were trying to cheat him. He frequently felt, on account of his disagreements with others, lonely and isolated-as if nearly everybody were his enemy and trying to injure him. But after he had made his will, supposing he had circumvented them by placing his property beyond their reach, he exclaimed, "When the damned vampires gather around me after I am gone, they will find nothing but dry bones." To this unhappy disposition, which made him miserable, there was joined in him a very high estimate of his own greatness. Though recognized as a bright and resourceful lawyer and an incorruptible legislator, he did not think his brilliancy, ability and integrity of purpose were sufficiently appreciated. He had an idea, not altogether incorrect, that in his sharp and crabbed way he said some very smart things and that his sayings would be or ought to be collected and would be admired by posterity. On one occasion, when he read of a public dinner pre. sided over by a governor where mutual-admiration healths were drunk and everybody was as usual filled with pudding and praise, he threw the newspaper down in disgust and remarked that he had never heard of Jesus Christ or himself being toasted at such dinners. But the most suggestive exhibition of his weakness in this respect was a clause in his will, by which he directed that his body, after being buried at Mont Eagle, should be covered with a very thick block of Scotch granite and that "no other monument shall be built to my memory there or elsewhere until the expiration of one hundred years from the time of my decease."

Upon his death, his will was contested by his wife; and the case was tried before the probate court of San Francisco, commencing November 14 and ending December 2, 1871. It was submitted to the jury mainly on the question as to whether Hawes was of sound and disposing mind when he executed it. Able attorneys were employed on both sides; but the contestant had the advantage of much popular sympathy on behalf of herself and children and of great popular prejudice against Hawes. Though no sane person could for a moment really believe him to have been insane, still the jury was induced to return a verdict that he was not of sound and disposing mind, thereby defeating the will; and the Chamber of Industry and Mont Eagle University fell with