fsm 
 
 «. 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 OF THE 
 
 University of California 
 
 GIFT OF 
 
 ^Accession 98825 Class Q &4~ 
 
 T53% 
 
 
 \JA 
 
 
 M' 
 
 1 -Si 
 
 j V^fc 
 
 3 
 
 ■*• 
 
 
 
 JUF* 
 
 «5^ 
 
 
 
 f ^ 
 
 ^^^ 
 
 
 2§* 
 
 
 
 C*^F 
 
 mm- 
 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 
 in 2007 with funding from 
 
 Microsoft Corporation 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/addressesOOphelrich 
 
Addresses 
 
 MAYOR JAMES D, PHELAN 
 
 San Francisco, J90K 
 
ADDRESSES 
 
 BY 
 
 MAYOR JAMES D. PHELAN 
 
 San Francisco, 1901. 
 
F 
 
 1 
 
 Addresses by Mayor James D. Pheean. 
 
 SAN FRANCISCO, 1901. 
 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The Principles of Washington and the Destiny of the Republic 5 
 
 Industrial Education 21 
 
 The Death of Verdi— Memorial Exercises 31 
 
 The Dedication of the Goethe-Schiller Monument 39 
 
 Welcome to President McKinley 43 
 
 The Death of President McKinley — Memorial Services 47 
 
 Debate with Imperial Chinese Consul, Ho Yow, at the Unita- 
 rian Club, on the Chinese Question 49 
 
 Valedictory Address to the Board of Supervisors, January, 
 1902 63 
 
 98825 
 
THE PRINCIPLES OF WASHINGTON 
 
 AND THE DESTINY OF THE REPUBLIC 
 
 An Address, Delivered by Mayor James D. Phelan, on Washington's 
 Birthday, 1901, at Metropolitan Temple, San Francisco, under 
 the Auspices of the Knights of St. Patrick. 
 
 More than one hundred years have passed since the 
 death of Washington, and he is today the central figure 
 in American history. The judgment of his contempo- 
 raries has been approved by subsequent generations, 
 and his birthday is the rallying point of freedom in 
 every land. He typifies honesty, courage, character, the 
 love of country and the love of liberty, as does no other 
 soldier- statesman of which the world has a record; and 
 it was because of these qualities that the great Irish 
 orator, Charles Philipps, grandly said of him — and I 
 will make his words the text of my address tonight — "No 
 country can claim him; no people can appropriate him. 
 The boon of Providence to the human race, his fame is 
 eternity and his residence creation." 
 
 We honor his memory; we recount his virtues, 
 which we would fain emulate; we recall the principles 
 which guided his public life, not idly, but in order that 
 they may exert their proper influence upon the destinies 
 of the Republic. Hence, our meeting this evening is 
 not for eulogy alone. It is for patriotic profit. 
 
It is interesting to the young men of today to learn 
 that his equipment was simple, if his school was hard. 
 George Washington, in addition to an elementary edu- 
 cation, acquired a knowledge of surveying, and, from 
 !ihe necessities of his employment, he became familiar 
 with the frontiers of Virginia, his native state. This 
 led him into the service of the provincial troops, and he 
 soon manifested his genius as a soldier. He was re- 
 nowned for his courage and good judgment and won 
 several engagements with the French and Indians in the 
 early wars. He wrote to his mother that the whistling 
 of bullets was music to his ears, which showed his love 
 for the excitement of the campaign, and, at the same 
 time, revealed the fact that he seemed to lead a charmed 
 life. Frequently exposed, his horses having been shot 
 under him on more than one occasion, he survived every 
 danger. 
 
 The wars over, he served as a member of the House 
 of Burgesses of Virginia; married Martha Custis, a 
 wealthy widow, and settled down on his estate at Mount 
 Vernon — property which belonged to his father and 
 which he had inherited from his brother. So great was 
 his reputation as a soldier and so sterling the quality of 
 his patriotism, that he was called to command the Con- 
 tinental troops when the colonies were forced to take 
 the field in defense of their liberties. 
 
 His task was a most arduous one — to discipline 
 country volunteers unused to war and put them in a 
 condition to meet the trained soldiers of England. He 
 had to urge upon Congress the measures necessary for 
 the raising of troops and the equipment of his army. 
 Every reyerse, and there were many, discouraged his men 
 and wearied Congress into inaction. The war was becom- 
 
ing, on account of its cost and its failures, a matter of 
 serious concern; but Washington never faltered in his 
 faith that the right would triumph; and it is safe to say 
 now, in calmly reviewing the history of the past, that 
 were it not for Washington, "the immortal rebel," 
 Congress would have probably abandoned the war and 
 made terms with the enemy. 
 
 But Washington cheered his ragged and half-starved 
 men, huddled together in the bitter cold of dreary 
 winters; he inspired his Generals with confidence in the 
 ultimate success of their arms, and was finally given, by 
 a reluctant Congress, those powers which they had 
 failed to wisely exercise. Against superior numbers, 
 he then pursued tactics which have earned him the 
 commendation of the world's great soldiers; attacking, 
 retreating, and harrassing the enemy, and never resting 
 until victory crowned his courage, his hardships and 
 his unfaltering faith. 
 
 After the surrender at Yorktown, he retired to his 
 beautiful home on the banks of the Potomac, where 
 extensive plantations awaited his patient care. He was 
 no thriftless farmer. He was most exact and exacting 
 in his business affairs, and with the love of outdoor life 
 acquired in his youth, he entered heartily into the culti- 
 vation of the soil, and, in an age of improvidence, made 
 his property yield surprising returns. His home was 
 the hospitable resort of every visitor, and he was never 
 happier than when entertaining his friends. Having 
 earned his rest, he hesitated to attend the Constitutional 
 Convention, called after the war to make a more perfect 
 union among the states; but finally realizing its impor- 
 tance, he sacrificed his comfort and cheerfully answered 
 again the call of Country. He made his pilgrimage to 
 
Philadelphia and was elected unanimously the President 
 of the Convention. 
 
 Through what anxiety did he pass! He fought over 
 again his battles for his country, and almost despaired 
 of satisfactory results. It must be borne in mind that, 
 prior to this time, the thirteen colonies had been bound 
 together by the slender ties of the Articles of Confedera- 
 tion, and no man realized more keenly than Washington 
 the inadequacy of such a bond. As a soldier, he knew 
 what a lack of cohesion in his army, jealousies and dis- 
 sensions among his Generals and insufficient authority 
 meant; and he finally maintained that, unless a Nation 
 were created out of the thirteen sovereignties, strong to 
 preserve its integrity and dignity and enforce its powers, 
 the fruits of the War of Independence would be surely 
 lost. 
 
 He insisted on mutual concessions. The work of the 
 Convention completed, he accepted it with confidence, 
 for, after acrimonious debates and the expression of 
 apparently irreconcilable views among the members of 
 the Convention, Washington, by his quiet influence and 
 by the weight of his exalted character, brought order 
 out of confusion, and so helped to create what Gladstone 
 has described as " the most wonderful work ever struck 
 off at a given time by the brain and purpose of man." 
 
 Then, when the question of the adoption of the Con- 
 stitution came before the states, requiring them to 
 surrender some of their powers to a central government, 
 which they feared, born of their experience with King 
 George, it was only the expectation that Washington 
 would be the first 'President under it that allayed their 
 apprehensions and won for it their approval. In fact, 
 it was not until after Washington's inauguration that 
 
Rhode Island and North Carolina gave to it their 
 adhesion. 
 
 Called to the Presidency by the unanimous vote of 
 the Electoral College, he again, leaving his beloved 
 home and the simplicity of his rural life, entered on his 
 duties, impelled not by a love of power or by the grati- 
 ficaton of a personal ambition, but amidst warring ele- 
 ments only held in abeyance by the public necessity, to 
 establish on a permanent basis the Republic which he 
 had created on the field and perpetuated in the council. 
 
 Washington, the incarnation of the idea for which his 
 patriotic soldiers fought and died, assumed the Presi- 
 dency and ingratiated, as no other man could have 
 done, the love of the Constitution in the hearts of the 
 people. 
 
 We can hardly appreciate the difficulties of the situa- 
 tion. The glory of these later days, however, conveys 
 no impression whatever of the inauspicious entry of 
 Washington into the domain of civil power. 
 
 Private and public credit was dead; the country was 
 burdened with debt by the long and exhausting war; 
 agriculture and commerce were paralyzed, and these 
 were the principal resources of the people. The con- 
 structive work of government, requiring patience and 
 sound judgment, was begun. Treaties had to be made 
 with foreign powers, which had no respect for our 
 strength. The labors of administration had none of the 
 glamor of war, and a universal depression sorely tried, 
 in those sad days, the patriotism and love of independ- 
 ence to which the people had offered up, as a sacrifice, 
 their lives and their fortunes. 
 
 We are reaping today the fruits of the fortitude of 
 Washington. For eight long years, as President, he 
 
labored in making us a Nation; and the impetus given 
 the country by his unselfish labors has borne us to the 
 heights of civic and material greatness, from which we 
 now review the history of the past. 
 
 He survived his public services a short year, and, 
 when he died, the immortal words sprang spontaneously 
 to the lips of his eulogist in the House of Bepresenta- 
 tives — Washington, easily first then as he is today — 
 " first in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his 
 countrymen." 
 
 For one hundred years, on the recurrence of February 
 22d, the day that gave him to his country, the people 
 have feebly endeavored to express their gratitude and, to 
 the growing generation, describe his worth. 
 
 His countrymen valued him for his stupendous servi- 
 ces, but European commentators marvel most at his for- 
 bearance. With the examples of Csesarism before them, 
 they could not understand the simplicity of life and 
 lofty patriotism which caused Washington to surrender 
 power when his work was done. 
 
 Byron exultingly exclaimed: 
 
 " Where may the weary eye repose 
 
 When gazing on the great, 
 Where neither guilty glory glows 
 
 Nor despicable state? 
 Yes, one— the first — the last — the best— 
 The Cincinnatus of the West, 
 
 Whom envy dared not hate, 
 Bequeath the name of Washington 
 To make men blush there was but one." 
 
 Lord Brougham very truly said that the test of the 
 progress of mankind in wisdom and virtue will be found 
 in the appreciation of the character of Washington; just, 
 
 10 
 
I say, as the Eepublic of America may be measured 
 today by its adherence to his farewell advice. 
 
 The people of the United States have allowed no 
 usurper to tarnish their inheritance from Washington; 
 they have generously rewarded disinterested public 
 service; they have cemented in their blood the National 
 Union, and should the Father of his Country return 
 today and follow the development of his ideas and 
 behold the extent and power of the United States, the 
 several State organizations — forty-five instead of the 
 original thirteen — acting harmoniously within their 
 separate spheres, he would bow approvingly. His hope 
 for the abolition of slavery, his desire for a stronger 
 union, have been realized. But that is not all. I believe 
 that the greatest fear of Washington for the future of 
 his country lay in its relations with foreign powers and 
 in the greed of empire, which experience had proved to 
 be the grave of Eepublics. 
 
 He repeatedly warned his countrymen against these 
 dangers; and now, a century after his death, we invoke 
 his shade to test our progress in political wisdom. We 
 call for the chart, by which the Kepublic has sailed so 
 successfully, to see if we are near the rocks. That 
 chart, ladies and gentlemen, is Washington's farewell 
 address. When he was about to surrender the govern- 
 ment of the United States to his successor and sympa- 
 thizer, John Adams, and to retire in his serene age to 
 the joys of private life, with no ambition ungratified, 
 inspired by the purest motives of patriotism, he calmly 
 wrote an address to his fellow- citizens, which embodies 
 the wisdom of the ages applied to the destiny of the 
 Eepublic. 
 
 Vain, indeed, would be our reverence for Washington, 
 
 11 
 
if we did not regard that document as the blessed herit- 
 age from a loving father. 
 
 What has been accomplished, and concerning which 
 he was so solicitous, is a strong government, the taming 
 of party spirit, the encouragement of religion, morality 
 and education, and the establishment of the public 
 credit; but, what can we say of our adherence to his 
 advice to preserve separate and independent the three 
 great functions of the government, the Executive, the 
 Legislative and the Judiciary; to act with good faith 
 and justice towards all nations, and to avoid entangling 
 alliances ? 
 
 It may be said, until the last few years, we have also 
 observed his sage counsel in these respects; but latterly 
 there has been a marked disposition to depart from it. 
 In fact, have we not already departed from it? Not, I 
 trust, have we gone so far but that there is yet time to 
 confess our error and mend our ways. 
 
 While as to common law rights, in the assertion of 
 which the Colonies rebelled, England was our model; as 
 to organization, policy and administration England was 
 our warning and dread. 
 
 The arbitrary acts of the King in Council had taught 
 us the lesson of tyranny. Montesqui had said that as 
 Rome and Sparta had lost their liberties and perished, 
 so the English Constitution would lose its liberty and 
 perish — it would perish as soon as the legislative power 
 had become more corrupt than the executive. Why did 
 -Montesqui believe that British liberty was wrapped up 
 in the integrity of Parliament? Because Parliament is 
 absolute and sovereign in its powers, and there is no 
 check upon its action. James Bryce defines it as fol- 
 lows : " The British Parliament has always been and 
 
 12 
 
remains now a sovereign and constituent assembly. It 
 can make and unmake every law, change the form of 
 government or the succession of the Crown, interfere 
 with the course of justice, extinguish the most sacred 
 private rights of the citizen. Between it and the people 
 at large there is no legal distinction, because the whole 
 plenitude of the people's rights and powers reside in it, 
 just as the whole nation were present within the cham- 
 ber where it sits. In point of legal theory it is the 
 Nation, being the historical successor of the Folk Moot 
 of our Teutonic forefathers. Both practically and 
 legally, it is today the only and efficient depository of 
 the authority of the Nation, and is therefore, within its 
 sphere of law, irresponsible and omnipotent." 
 
 For these, among other reasons, the people, in con- 
 structing their constitutional Bepublic, delegated only 
 limited powers to the President and to Congress, defin- 
 ing their spheres of action, and even provided for two 
 houses, in order that one might be a check upon the 
 other. The Judiciary was made another and sepa- 
 rate department, to regulate the system and keep legis- 
 lative powers, National and State, within their prescribed 
 limits, and at the same time, to guard against the 
 encroachments of the Executive. 
 
 But we find that usurpation of authority has been 
 attempted. The President or the Congress, in asserting 
 the right to impose despotic government upon the people 
 of our newly acquired territory, are following the very lines 
 pursued by England towards this country in the days of 
 "Washington, and for whose successful resistance to 
 which we honor him tonight. While England had per- 
 haps the legal power — although James Otis in his great 
 argument held that even the English Constitution did 
 
 13 
 
not permit taxation without representation — it certainly 
 did not have the moral right. We have neither the legal 
 power nor the moral right to acquire and rule depend- 
 ent colonies as vassal states. It would be preposterous 
 to imagine that George Washington should have helped 
 to make a constitution which conferred power on the 
 President or the Congress to enslave other peoples. All 
 America asked of England was justice, and so Washing- 
 ton enjoined upon us, in his farewell address, the 
 observance of " justice toward all nations." 
 
 And yet, listen to the words which have been 
 spoken in Congress and to Congress, and apparently 
 accepted by the government as its policy. So spoke 
 recently a member of Congress: " We hold the islands 
 as a common possession, province, colony, territory or 
 whatever it may be called, belonging to the States, 
 which in their confederate capacity constitute the 
 National Union. We may deal with and govern these 
 new possessions as we please, unrestricted, except by 
 our intelligent ideas of humanity, civilization, liberty 
 and good government. We may govern them with a 
 government absolutely despotic in its character." 
 
 That was the attitude of England in colonial days, 
 and against which Washington has warned us again 
 and again. England was taught her lesson by us; shall 
 we not be taught ourselves by our own teaching? 
 
 Daniel Webster said in the Senate, March 23, 1848 — 
 are his words prophetic? "Arbitrary governments may 
 have territories and distant possessions, because arbi- 
 trary governments may rule them by different laws and 
 different systems. We can do no such thing. They 
 must be of us, part of us, or else strangers. I think I 
 see a course adopted which is likely to turn the consti- 
 
 14 
 
tution of the land into a deformed monster, into a curse 
 rather than a blessing; in fact, a frame of an unequal 
 government, not founded on popular representation, 
 not founded on equality, but on the grossest inequality; 
 and I think that this process will go on, or that there is 
 danger that it will go on, until this Union shall fall to 
 pieces." 
 
 James Anthony Froude, the great historian, speaking 
 to his countrymen, said: " The early Romans possessed 
 the faculty of self-government beyond any people of 
 whom we have historical knowledge, with one exception 
 of ourselves. In virtue of their temporal freedom, they 
 became the most powerful nation in the known world; 
 and their liberties perished only when Rome became 
 the mistress of conquered races, to whom she was unwill- 
 ing or unable to extend her privileges." The imperial 
 tendencies of England, he says, may lead her over the 
 same course to the same end. " If there is one lesson 
 which history clearly teaches it is this : that free nations 
 cannot govern subject provinces. If they are unwilling 
 or unable to admit their dependencies to a share of their 
 own constitution, the constitution itself will fall in pieces 
 from mere incompetence for its duties." 
 
 England was not willing to treat its colonies with 
 equal justice. Why? For the very same reason that 
 we are endeavoring to justify our attitude towards the 
 Porto Ricans and Filipinos. Inspired by their love of 
 Washington, they, a deluded people, believed, alas! that 
 a just Providence had made America their deliverer. 
 
 Let us watch the course of Empire, lest the Empire 
 outrun the Republic. 
 
 One of the causes of the Revolution which gave 
 Washington to the world — to France, to Ireland, to 
 
 15 
 
South Africa, to Cuba, to Porto Eico and the Philip- 
 pines alike (because "no country can claim him; no 
 people can appropriate him," and because he was " the 
 boon of Providence to the human race") — was the 
 appointment of a Commission by England (witness 
 how history persists in repeating itself) to provide " the 
 means of making the Colonies most useful and benefi- 
 cial to England; to enquire into the staples and manu- 
 factures which may be encouraged there, and the means 
 of diverting them from trades which may prove beneficial 
 to England." As a result, colonial trade and manufac- 
 tures were dwarfed or destroyed, just as the industries 
 of Ireland have been suppressed and her people dis- 
 persed. But the Americans had to make their stand, 
 just as the Boers are doing to day in South Africa. 
 Shall we not be generous in our treatment of the Fili- 
 pinos and charitable in judging of them? 
 
 The constitution was adopted to secure the blessings 
 of liberty, and not to secure j the blessings of trade. I 
 submit, that colonies held in subjection outside the 
 constituion for tribute and trade purposes will, as 
 shown by the experiences of history, ultimately destroy 
 the liberties of our Nation and it will perish. I hold 
 that the interests of trade are best subserved, in the 
 words of Washington, by observing good faith and 
 justice towards all peoples, which we are not doing. 
 Washington said wisely of our trade policy as "diffus- 
 ing and diversifying by gentle means the streams of 
 commerce, but forcing nothing." 
 
 What would he say of the policy, alike fatuous and 
 criminal, of exterminating a race of people — educated, 
 intelligent and liberty -loving — to make way for the sale 
 of goods or for the occupation of their territory by the 
 
 16 
 
" Sons of Liberty," for such were his Americans, the 
 Colonists, called? Are there no other Sons of Liberty 
 in the wide world? Does only Washington's and Jef- 
 ferson's government derive its "just powers from the 
 consent of the governed?" 
 
 Washington foresaw the greatness of the Republic. 
 In twenty years from the date of his administra- 
 tion, he said, the country would be in a position, 
 by reason of its growth and resources, to assume an 
 equal position among the nations of the world and 
 enforce its rights, it necessary, by war. He foresaw 
 continental expansion. He said our " peculiar and 
 remote situation," occupying this continent, made us 
 strong and independent. He urged that Europe "has a 
 set of primary interests, which to us have none or a very 
 remote relation." " The great rule," he said, " for us in 
 regard to foreign nations is, in extending our commer- 
 cial relations, to have with them as little political con- 
 nection as possible." 
 
 The wisdom of this policy is certainly as true now as 
 it was then. If we favor one nation we excite the ani- 
 mosity of others. On the continent, nations form com- 
 binations, as the Triple Alliance, excluding from equal 
 advantages some and conferring benefits on others. 
 There, it may be necessary in the game of diplomacy, 
 to preserve the balance of power; but so long as we hold 
 our unique position on this continent, by simply exclud- 
 ing Europe from interference and refusing on our 
 part to interfere in its affairs, we avert wasteful wars 
 and best promote commerce and civilization. We hold 
 the two Americas sacred for Republican government. 
 It is equally our duty and our interest to do so. What 
 becomes of the Monroe doctrine when we make Asiatic 
 excursions ? 
 
 17 
 
But, in spite of our traditional Washingtonian policy, 
 there is even a movement to form an English alliance. 
 How truly do Washington's words fit the present condi- 
 tions: " It is a folly for one nation to look for disinter- 
 ested favors from another; that it must pay with a 
 portion of its independence for whatever it may accept 
 under that character * * * and be reproached with 
 ingratitude for not giving more. There can be no 
 greater error than to expect or calculate upon real 
 favors from nation to nation." 
 
 In other words, we must not surrender the advantages 
 of our position and involve ourselves in the troubles of 
 others; treat all nations fairly and equally, and expect — 
 nay, demand — the same treatment in return. No excep- 
 tion can be made to such a course. Why should Eng- 
 land be preferred? The great Republic of the West, 
 whose citizenship is composed of the people of all 
 countries, shall not be used to support England in its 
 contentions with either the weak or the strong, nor 
 save it from the consequences of its own folly or 
 avarice. 
 
 We can well afford to stand alone, and we want to be 
 let alone. That is the Monroe doctrine. No country 
 was ever less dependent — even upon commerce. Wash- 
 ington was the father of the policy of neutrality. When 
 Jefferson wanted an alliance with France, the Sage of 
 Monticello, in the heat of debate, accused Washington 
 of English predilections, to which Washington replied, 
 that if such were true, he would be the most deceitful 
 and uncandid of living men, for he had given Jefferson 
 his views on that' subject " with an energy which could 
 not be mistaken." 
 
 No; neutrality was Washington's idea. It is now the 
 
 18 
 
American idea, and the logic of events has proved and 
 will further prove its wisdom. 
 
 When the Eepublicans and Federalists, after Wash- 
 ington's death, moved by French and English prejudices 
 respectively, had fought out the issue, Henry Clay, as 
 the leader of the new generation, re-established the 
 principle and the policy. The vindication of Washing- 
 ton was complete. 
 
 And yet, the Father of his Country had rebellious 
 children. His path was not strewn with roses and 
 bedecked with garlands, as the schoolboy believes. One 
 political critic said: "He is arbitrary, avaricious, 
 ostentatious. Without skill as a soldier, he has crept 
 into fame by the places he has held. History will tear 
 the pages devoted to his praise." The tone of opposi- 
 tion journals, throughout the country, is fairly shown 
 by the comments of one on his retirement from the 
 Presidency: " When a retrospect is made of his admin- 
 istration, it is a subject of the greatest astonishment that 
 a single individual should have cankered the principles 
 of republicanism in an enlightened people, just emerged 
 from the gulf of despotism, and should have carried his 
 designs against the public liberties so far as to have put 
 in jeopardy their very existence. Such, however, are the 
 facts. This day ought to be a jubilee in the United 
 States." 
 
 "Such are the facts," indeed! The facts are that 
 partisan blindness not only does not see, but does not 
 want to see. The facts are that Washington was greater 
 than his party, because he served an ideal, which was 
 his conception, in that formative and critical era, of 
 what his country should be, which partisan detractors 
 were too small to understand; and, instead of his retire- 
 
 19 
 
ment from public life being made a day of jubilee, it lias 
 come to pass that his entrance to the world's stage, his 
 birthday, is the day dearer than any other connected 
 with great names in the estimation of his countrymen. 
 It is, in fact, the only birthday of soldier or statesman 
 that we do celebrate. 
 
 Washington's fame is secure. Is his country equally 
 secure? As long as we can honestly accept his farewell 
 advice, we shall avoid the rocks upon which Republics 
 have split; when, however, we depart from it and aban- 
 don the American idea, for which Washington pre-emi- 
 nently stands, we may well be apprehensive of the 
 dangers which beset us and which will perhaps over- 
 whelm us. 
 
 Before this country had entered upon its Colonial 
 policy, the United States had been described as a gov- 
 ernment without a precedent in history and without a 
 parallel. Let our people understand what this signifies, 
 and not become what other nations have been and are, 
 and share their common fate. Let our peculiar insti- 
 tutions and the National policy, which we have received 
 in trust, be transmitted unimpaired to posterity, as 
 Washington's boon to the human race. 
 
 20 
 
INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION 
 
 OR 
 
 The Advantages of Trade Education for Boys 
 
 An address delivered by James D. Phelan, Mayor of San Francisco, 
 before the Young Men's Christian Association, San Francisco, 
 September 10, 1901, on the occasion of the opening of a Night 
 Trade School. 
 
 Printed by the Association. 
 
 What interests men and women who are hard at work 
 in a great city, in whose life and whose development they 
 are wrapped up and of which they become, consciously 
 or unconsciously, a part, is the industrial possibilities of 
 the place and what the future holds. 
 
 From the beginning, the peaceful destiny of America 
 has been its most prominent characteristic. When the 
 Old World was torn with turmoil, wars and social 
 upheavals, blighted trade and scattered commerce, 
 America was looked upon as the certain future field of 
 the world's greatest industrial and commercial achieve- 
 ments. It appeared, indeed, an inviting field for man's 
 enterprise and industry, where he could work without 
 molestation and reap his reward. 
 
 Napoleon, after the cession of Louisiana, expressing 
 a sentiment which no doubt inspired him to make 
 favorable terms with Jefferson, exclaimed: "I have 
 
 21 
 
given to England a rival which will sooner or late 
 humble her pride." 
 
 When the social fabric of France was shattered and 
 an exhausted people, drained of apparently every 
 resource, stood with empty hands, as the gaunt monu- 
 ments of a destroyed industrial fabric, Carlyle, mocking 
 Burke's words, said: "The age of chivalry is gone and 
 could not but go, having now produced the still more 
 indomitable age of hunger." 
 
 All eyes were turned towards the New World. 
 
 At that time there were practically no manufactures. 
 Life was comparatively simple. Amusements were few. 
 Agriculture was the principal occupation of the people. 
 But by degrees, with the growth of manufactures, cities 
 developed wonderfully in population, numbers and 
 extent, until the habits of the race were changed and 
 the status of man as a tool-using animal was re-estab- 
 lished on new lines. 
 
 Machinery fostered this new tendency by cutting 
 down the numbers engaged in and the remuneration 
 paid for agricultural employment, on the one hand, and 
 gave enormous scope to the manufacturing enterprises 
 on the other. And those changes are going on today. 
 Men lose employment in the cities, by reason of labor 
 saving devices, and skilled mechanics have to learn new 
 arts or trades in order to subsist. While this works 
 great individual hardship in many instances, still it is 
 something that can not and will not be restrained, and 
 which will ultimately, by cheapening the cost of produc- 
 tion and adding to the comforts of life, compensate for 
 apparent injury and loss. Another field opens from the 
 one that is closed; and yet it is hard to convince the 
 disemployed men of these facts. 
 
 In the life of Benjamin Franklin you will read a 
 
curious story of how one morning, while Franklin was 
 in London, t King decided to wear his own natural 
 hair. Up to that time every gentleman wore a wig. At 
 once the wigmakers held a meeting and petitioned his 
 majesty to cease from wearing his own natural hair, 
 because their trade would be destroyed. They enumer- 
 ated the number of • men engaged in it and said, as a 
 final and conclusive argument, that in their places 
 French barbers and hairdressers would come across 
 the channel and take the bread out of their mouths and 
 the shingles off their roofs. 
 
 Now what would you have done in that case? The 
 King continued to wear his natural hair, and every gen- 
 tleman in the land followed his example, and the wig- 
 makers lost their employment; but, in the course of a 
 short time the wigmakers' sons became barbers and 
 hairdressers, and found a more extensive employment, 
 because, whereas a wig would last for a very long time, 
 the natural hair of a man will grow and be in need of 
 dressing, and probably in the United Kingdom a great 
 deal more money was spent for this reason in the bar- 
 ber's chair than formerly ever had been spent in the 
 wigmaker's shop. 
 
 So men engaged in industrial employments may be 
 shortsighted in their demands; and recently I saw, to 
 my surprise, that an association of the Brotherhood of 
 Engineers and Trainmen, I believe, petitioned the leg- 
 islature of one of the Middle Western States not to 
 reduce fares and freights because their wages would 
 possibly be reduced. I do not know what the legislature 
 did, but I am satisfied that if it reduced fares and 
 freights, the increased volume of business would com- 
 pensate for the loss which the petitioners had imagined 
 would ensue. 
 
 23 
 
It is always a safe rule to consider the interests of the 
 greatest number in all these matters, because, in case 
 railroad fares and freights are oppressive, a man can not 
 get his goods to market, or, in getting them to market, 
 will have to make a forced contribution to the common 
 carrier, which absorbs his profit and visits the commu- 
 nity with chronic depression and perennial hard times; 
 and no employe is either safely secure or properly re- 
 warded in his employment where whole communities of 
 men suffer from a real grievance or wrong. 
 
 With the changing times, fashion inviting and inven- 
 tion compelling change, there is no certainty in 
 employment unless a deep foundation in technical 
 knowledge is laid, or a man's versatility be broad and 
 his adaptability to new conditions be easy. 
 
 A man must, in these days, be progressive and move 
 with the age in which he lives. There is nothing so 
 stable that is not subject to the law of change or to the 
 exigencies of accident. You will remember in Hamlet 
 how the two old grave-diggers conversed. One pro- 
 pounds the conundrum, "What is he that builds 
 stronger than . either the mason, the shipwright or the 
 carpenter?" and the answer is "The grave-digger, 
 because the house that he makes lasts till doomsday." 
 
 That seemed a good answer in Hamlet's time, but in 
 our modern cities we move even the graves of the dead; 
 cemeteries change their locations, and even the grave 
 digger himself is superseded by the fireman who attends 
 the crematory! 
 
 Certainly one of the great duties of a well ordered 
 municipality, which absorbs in its greedy maw such 
 vast populations, tempting the farmer's boy from his 
 native fields, and bringing up a progeny of its own 
 which throngs its streets, is to keep everyone, if possi- 
 
 24 
 
ble, well employed. The want of skill is a serious 
 handicap in the industrial world, and the hard life of 
 the seaman keeps the city bred boy at home. With us, 
 employment on the sea has its drawbacks; on the land, 
 its limitations. But in this great port training ships 
 should accustom the boys to the sea and teach them the 
 duties of the sailor, so that they will ultimately take the 
 place of the hardened Jack tar and give the merchant 
 marine service a class of men worthy that fascinating 
 and venturesome, honorable and heroic vocation, which 
 in all ages has been the forerunner and the feeding 
 stream of national prestige and commercial supremacy. 
 
 But in order to have trade we must give as well as 
 receive; and the city that produces nothing, nothing 
 shall she have. The commerce of San Francisco is with 
 the world, but more particularly with the American 
 coast, the islands of the Pacific and the great Oriental 
 shores beyond, and their wants we must studiously cul- 
 tivate. But in order to compete in the markets of the 
 world we must produce the best, or as good as the best; 
 and in order to give employment to our people and 
 bring wealth to our community, we can not continue, as 
 we have been doing, in purchasing goods made in Ger- 
 many and in France and in England, or continue to 
 import skilled labor whenever any manufacturing 
 enterprise is projected. 
 
 The secret of the success of the great European cities, 
 among other things, consists very largely in something 
 that we have not fostered, nor has any American com- 
 munity conspicuously encouraged, and that is the 
 establishment of schools to give trade and technical 
 education. When we mention the name of Paris, we at 
 once conjure up in our imagination everything that is 
 dainty, beautiful and artistic; and looking for the source 
 
 25 
 
of Parisian success, we at once see that, even in the 
 primary schools, manual training, the rudiments of 
 design and familiarity with tools is inculcated. From 
 the primary school the pupil may go, at thirteen, into a 
 trade as an apprentice, and provision is made for the 
 continuance of his studies, either in the every day 
 classes or in night schools. If he desires to qualify for 
 the civil service of his country, there are high schools 
 for that purpose. If he goes in for a skilled trade, there 
 are professional colleges to impart technical knowledge; 
 and they all bear directly on the trades which are pros- 
 perously conducted in France. They teach work in 
 wood and iron and in the decorative arts. They teach 
 chemistry and physics,- furniture making, and uphol- 
 stery, printing, lithography, bookbinding, photography, 
 photogravure, and many new mechanical branches of 
 the reproductive arts. There are schools for girls, in 
 which dressmaking and millinery, and various other 
 industrial arts, as well as the domestic occupations, are 
 made the objects of patient care. 
 
 But the peculiarity of these schools is that they teach 
 those industries which are best adapted to the localities 
 in which the schools are established; as in Lille, in the 
 north of France, for example, young men are trained 
 in the knowledge of the great textile and mechanical 
 industries which thrive in that region. And what we 
 say of France can also be said of England and Scotland. 
 In Glasgow trade schools directly promote the ship- 
 building, the chemical and the textile manufactures of 
 Clyde Valley. The Manchester municipal technical 
 schools include a great spinning and weaving school, in 
 which everything pertaining to those industries is 
 taught in such a manner as to assure the maintenance 
 of Manchester's supremacy in the textile industries. A 
 
 26 
 
school of art and design and several important schools 
 of mechanical arts and engineering, and practical trades 
 are also established. 
 
 The most recent authority on these subjects says that 
 England now feels that she has found, in technical edu- 
 cation, the best form of protection for her industries. 
 Certainly that protection which comes from the merit 
 of the article itself, commanding a purchaser by its 
 superiority, is a protection that will be superior to all 
 statutes; and, as we have seen in too many instances, 
 enables the article to leap over every barrier that is 
 raised between it and the market. 
 
 The complaint which has been made about our edu- 
 cation is that it is of such a character that it unfits men 
 for manual toil rather than qualifies them for it; and as 
 productive or other labor must be the lot of the vast 
 majority of men, and as it is desirable that it be so for 
 the individual's own good, aud for the advancement and 
 prosperity of the country, the character and form of 
 education becomes a matter of most vital importance to 
 the welfare of city and state. The University of Cali- 
 fornia was the recipient of land grants conditional upon 
 its devoting a large part of its work, which it is doing, 
 to the application of scientific knowledge to the com- 
 mercial, agricultural and manufacturing employments. 
 
 The Board o£ Education of this city has successfully 
 introduced a system of manual training. The Lick and 
 Cogswell schools in San Francisco, with a small capac- 
 ity it is true, are working on practical lines, and recently 
 h e Wilmerding School, of a similar character, has been 
 established, and tonight your own; hence, the future 
 gives glimmerings of promise. 
 
 In the recent past there were no facilities to acquire 
 a knowledge of a trade or a profession or an art in 
 
 27 
 
schools where men are unconsciously guided as in the 
 public schools today; or where young boys and girls 
 might apply themselves to studies in the selection of 
 which they had a pronounced choice; and hence, only 
 a general education was given which, while extremely 
 desirable in itself, is not inconsistent with the knowledge 
 of some useful handicraft, trade or profession, which 
 would be a delight and a pleasure, a ready means of 
 livelihood and a substantial contribution to the wealth 
 and prosperity of the place in which we live. 
 
 The productive industries of a community yield the 
 best returns. It is the man who makes the blade of 
 grass grow where none grew before, who creates some- 
 thing useful or beautiful out of the crude material, who 
 is in the best sense a benefactor. Towards such bene- 
 faction it is possible for every man to contribute, no 
 matter what may be his means or his condition. 
 
 You do not, perhaps, appreciate the advantages you 
 enjoy as boys of the twentieth century. 
 
 You must remember, at one time, it was the policy of 
 the different countries to keep their knowledge and 
 manufacturing secrets to themselves; and as late as 
 1761 the British Society of Arts, in giving what was 
 probably the first National Fair, forbade drawings to 
 be made of the machinery on exhibition and went so 
 far as to guarantee the exhibitors against the presence 
 of foreign spies. 
 
 France, for instance, guarded certain industrial secrets 
 for centuries, and they were only revealed to England 
 and the world by the emigration of the Huguenots; and 
 to acquire a knowledge of shipbuilding, you will re- 
 member even Peter of Russia had to work in the low 
 countries as a common mechanic. 
 
 Then again, in those days, the feudal prejudice against 
 
 28 
 
labor was not wholly extinct. The Knights of Industry, 
 who worked with most success, plied their avocation 
 on the King's highways. Honorable industrial employ- 
 ment had no especial reward or recognition; but slowly 
 labor was emancipating itself, and the desire to excel in 
 " the arts of peace " took hold of nations as well as of 
 men; and as men proudly exhibited their work at 
 National Fairs, so Nations entered the lists of Inter- 
 national Exhibitions; and thus it came to pass that 
 International Exhibitions, by breaking down all narrow 
 barriers, hastened the dawn of the new era for the arts 
 and manufactures of the world. 
 
 Remember also, as citizens of a great commercial 
 emporium, that the producer can not stand alone. In 
 every scheme of industrial employment there is provis- 
 ion made, even by the cold political economists, for the 
 wages of superintendence. Yet the farmer in the 
 interior calls the merchant of San Francisco the toll 
 gatherer at the gate. The producer looks with suspi- 
 cion, never appreciating their value, upon what he calls 
 the middlemen; but the middlemen are as necessary a 
 part of the economic machine as the producer himself. 
 What avails production, unless that which is produced 
 is exchanged for something of value; and the producer 
 can not both produce and become his own agent in the 
 markets of the world, which is properly the field of 
 commerce and trade. Now, every man who is engaged 
 in the store, or shop, or the commercial house aids in 
 bringing the buyer and the seller together, and performs 
 a vital and important function, and his employment is 
 just as honorable and just as useful as any other. 
 
 San Francisco, dowered by Nature with a harbor and 
 tributary country equal to any, has exploited the wealth 
 of mine, field, orchard and forest. A new era has, how- 
 
 29 
 
ever, just awakened. Well may we pause to think of 
 future possibilities, when, by the actual harnessing of 
 mountain streams and the production of oil in unpar- 
 alleled volume, electric energy and steam may be 
 generated to propel the wheels of industry! We may 
 now manufacture all those things for which in the past 
 we depended on Europe and the Eastern States, simply 
 serving them as a point of distribution, producing 
 little ourselves. 
 
 The cost of coal once barred the door against us; now 
 the development of cheap power has opened it. 
 
 The trade and commerce of California should, with 
 the willing and skilled hands of our boys, add a new 
 and glorious chapter to American progress and civ- 
 ilization. 
 
 The hopes of mankind have not been disappointed in 
 America. She has vindicated her destiny of peace. 
 Wide acres and weak neighbors have made the task 
 easy. She has given dignity to labor and destroyed the 
 false pretensions of the " age of chivalry." 
 
 Not only is labor made honorable, but every honora- 
 ble American seeks rather than shuns labor; and every 
 community should see that the labor of its citizens is 
 made useful and be directed into channels which will 
 be the most remunerative to the man and the most 
 advantageous to the State. 
 
 These are the tendencies of the times, and let us hope 
 that out of them great good will come; and that the 
 hero of the future will not necessarily be " the man on 
 horseback; " not alone the man who, on occasions, fights 
 for his country, but he who, in whatever capacity he 
 may be employed — whether it be a-foot or a-horse — 
 makes his country worthy fighting for. 
 
 30 
 
VERDI MEMORIAL EXERCISES 
 
 Address by Mayor James D. Phelan, at the Tivoli Opera House 
 San Francisco, February 24, 1901, 
 
 It is creditable to the citizens of San Francisco to 
 meet here today to honor one of the master minds of 
 the world. It has been said that there is nothing great 
 on earth but man, and nothing great in man but mind. 
 Myriads of men are born, labor, live and die — "All who 
 walk the earth are but a handful to those who sleep 
 within its bosom " — and yet, through all the ages, how few 
 have been endowed with the spark of immortal genius, 
 the divine afflatus, the gift of the gods, which distin- 
 guishes them from their fellows, to dignify humanity 
 and to illumine the darkness which envelops us. In 
 Giuseppe Yerdi we have such a man. 
 
 What are the lives of kings and queens, ordinary 
 mortals, born to power in a narrow sphere, who if they 
 do not abuse it, are esteemed gracious sovereigns? 
 Indeed, we are grateful if they do us no injury. Com- 
 pare, however, the dynasties of Hanoverian and Plan- 
 tagenet with the beneficent rule of genius, elevating 
 mankind, whose empire is the uncircumscribed realms 
 of thought, and whose willing and delighted subjects 
 are all the people of every land. Yerdi's death, there- 
 fore, is the sorrow of the world. 
 
 31 
 
Here in California, we are a cosmopolitan people. 
 Every land has made a contribution to our citizenship, 
 and each is proud of a particular ancestry. How proud 
 are the Italians of their Verdi! They call us here 
 today, and we gladly respond, to pay our debt of grati- 
 tude to the greatest musical composer of the century. 
 
 There are tongues which we do not understand, but 
 music is the common language of the world, and when 
 Verdi speaks to us, our emotions — sensitive to his art — 
 hearken to the voice of the master. We understand 
 him; we answer his passionate appeals; we rejoice in 
 his triumphs; we bend to his reproof. He sings of the 
 life of man in the exalted cadences of the lyric muse, 
 stirring to action the slumbering soul or faltering heart. 
 His is the sublimation of eloquence. 
 
 As the faculties of man are God-given, he who em- 
 ploys them in their highest perfection must best be serv- 
 ing God. The genius who creates is like unto Divinity. 
 The power which can awaken love and fear, pity and 
 remorse, by the varying strains of his music, myste- 
 riously persuasive, resembles the voice of conscience 
 and suggests the spirit which dominates the universe. 
 That is the pinnacle of human attainment. That is the 
 consummation of art. 
 
 It is not the wealth of a Croesus nor the despotic 
 sway of a Caesar that excites our real wonder or admira- 
 tion, it is the triumph of thought; it is the assertion of 
 the mastery of the mind. It is not the mere pomp of 
 r or the luxury of wealth — it is the influence of the 
 true and the beautiful that betokens the progress of 
 civilization. There is no compulsion of tyrants in our 
 appreciation of Verdi's art. It is the allegiance of love. 
 
 Who was this Italian boy who lived to rank in his 
 
 32 
 
sphere with the greatest of mankind? He was born 
 eighty-six years ago, in the Duchy of Parma, of poor 
 parents, who kept a village store. He enjoyed no 
 adventitious advantages, yet rose rapidly in a profes- 
 sion, in which he was encouraged by musical friends, 
 and again seriously discouraged in his nineteenth year 
 by his rejection at the Conservatory of Milan. 
 
 But perseverance kindled his native talents — in fact, 
 it has been said that genius is nothiug but hard work — 
 until he was able to refuse the highest decoration prof- 
 ferred by his King. He was singularly independent, 
 and sought only the approval of the people; hence, it 
 is safe to say that his music will live, because it is 
 the expression of human nature. He did not, like 
 others, endeavor to create a taste by which he would be 
 enjoyed. 
 
 He gave poetry to life and lifted it from sordid ways 
 to hopefulness and enthusiasm, and the people rose to 
 their leader. His first operas were introduced with 
 difficulty, which all beginners experience; but the 
 Italian ear, long trained in musical composition and 
 with inherited taste from of old, accepted Verdi as a 
 master. When once known, he was thereafter loved. 
 
 He is classed by the critics as the head of the Italian 
 romantic school. It is claimed for Rossini, his distin- 
 guished countryman, that he was more of the classical, 
 as his operas, with which we are familiar, will testify — 
 " The Barber of Seville " and u William Tell." Another 
 countryman and also a contemporary, perhaps influenced 
 the more — Donezetti, whose " Lucia di Lamermoor," 
 " La Favorita " and "Don Pasquale " have entertained 
 us so often, even in this modest Temple. 
 
 Bellini had composed his great works before Verdi 
 
fairly began his career; but his "La Sonnambula," 
 "Norma "and "I Puritani" found favor with his rising 
 countryman. 
 
 But just as Ford and JMassinger and Beaumont and 
 Fletcher preceded Shakespeare, so Rossini, Donezetti 
 and Bellini heralded the coming of Verdi, who was to 
 surpass them all. 
 
 It has been alleged that Wagner also influenced 
 Verdi's later work, but eminent critics dispute this. 
 Wagner is mainly dramatic. He fits the strain to 
 the language. He subordinates the music to his 
 subject. One critic states that in Italian opera, music 
 and melody are the prime considerations. Under the 
 Wagnerian teaching, the full and right dramatic expres- 
 sion became the chief aim, and that involved a sub- 
 serviency of the thoughtful in music. It is the differ- 
 ence between Byron and Ossian. 
 
 If this be true, it is Verdi who has preserved consist- 
 ently the beautiful in music against the incursions of 
 the more robust school of the north, which no doubt 
 has excellent claims for the consideration of its peculiar 
 style. All we can ask ourselves is, however, what 
 pleases us most? The popular verdict will support the 
 sweetness and the beauty of the Italian school, which 
 appeals not to the dramatic in our nature so much as 
 to the homely joys and common pleasures, which fill 
 so much of our daily life — " Not too pure and good for 
 human nature's daily food." It comes to our doors and 
 does not violently translate us to strange places or to 
 rude peoples possessing rudimentary manners. Loving 
 is wooing and persuasion and gentleness; not declama- 
 tion and terror! 
 
 When one is mad and tempestuous in love, jealousy 
 
 34 
 
or anger, he may go to Wagner and storm like the gods 
 in their wrath. Wagner wrote of an age half barbaric; 
 Verdi of cultivated and civilized life; but in "Aida " he 
 showed his Wagnerian capacity for the treatment of 
 strong and fearful natures that characterize the untamed 
 spirit of the old Egyptians. 
 
 What versatility! What capacity ! Of Verdi's thirty 
 operas, his Shakespearean "Falstaff" (which many 
 assert is his greatest composition) was written by him 
 at the age of eighty-one. The critics say that in form, 
 harmonization and orchestration it is his masterpiece. 
 
 The first period of his work is illustrated by " Nu- 
 bucco," "I Lombardi" and "Ernani;" the second by 
 "Kigoletto," "La Traviata" and "II Trovatore," and 
 the third and greatest period, showing his full develop- 
 ment, by the operas "Aida," "Othello" and "Ealstaff." 
 
 Whatever may be the judgment of mere critics, who, 
 after all, compose but a small portion of an audience, 
 the melodies of "Kigoletto," "La Traviata" and "II 
 Trovatore " will, as now, reach the popular heart of suc- 
 ceeding generations, and from St. Petersburg to San 
 Francisco the music will be sung as long as love lasts — 
 and love is the dominant, ineradicable and necessary 
 passion of the world; and after life is fled, the strains 
 of the master, still true to human nature, it is said, will 
 linger somewhere between the angels and the demons, 
 and will possess, even then, power to mollify the pangs 
 of perdition. Does not Owen Meredith sing: 
 
 " Of all the operas that Verdi wrote 
 
 The best, to my taste, is " II Trovatore,' 
 And Mario can soothe with a tenor note 
 The souls in Purgatory." 
 
 But death will not silence his voice. His songs will 
 
be sung forever and aye, and his disciples will lovingly 
 take up his work. When Mascagni, his countryman, 
 produced the " Cavalleria Kusticana," Verdi said, " I 
 can die in peace now that Mascagni has produced his 
 opera." 
 
 After a remarkable life, during which he raised high 
 the standard of art, created music which is chanted and 
 applauded by the world, patriotically championing his 
 country's cause, and benevolently giving his vast 
 fortune for the care of the old musicians, whose 
 inspired instruments had given voice and expression to 
 the children of his soul, he died, at the age of four- 
 score years and six, honored and beloved, not alone 
 by his countrymen, but by millions of men and women, 
 who were and are still the daily recipients of his 
 sublime messages, written in undying melody. 
 
 That is immortality on this earth — to live in one's 
 creative works; and it is the state wherein mortals most 
 resemble the gods. 
 
 Our Italian- American citizens perform a worthy serv- 
 ice by commemorating their great names. Our country 
 is made up of all nationalities, and therefore has a 
 peculiar right to join in this expression of gratitude. 
 Aye, there are special reasons: To Italy we owe Colum- 
 bus and Amerigo Vespucci, so we are wedded by 
 discovery as well as by name — America, Columbia — 
 to that historic race. 
 
 Italy is the home of Art and Science. From the 
 Roman days to the present time, there has been a long 
 succession of men of genius. Such names as Rafael, 
 Michael Angelo; Dante, Petrarch, Tasso and Gallileo 
 suggest the greatest achievements of the mind of man. 
 
 There is much in the mountains and valleys, sky and 
 
sea of beautifull ifcaly to inspire genius; and perhaps the 
 physical joy of life, in that favored land, had much to 
 do with the glory of her sons. 
 
 In all physical respects, California resembles Italy. 
 Our skies, our mountains, our valleys are not less fair. 
 May we not hope to emulate in Art and Science the 
 older land, whose sons have done so much for the prog- 
 ress of the world and whose unfading beauty has self- 
 conferred an immortality all its own. 
 
 "Fair Italy! 
 Thou art the garden of the world, the home 
 Of all Art yields and Nature can decree; 
 Even in thy desert, what is like to thee? 
 Thy very weeds are beautiful, thy waste 
 More rich than other lands' fertility ; 
 Thy wreck a glory and thy ruin grand 
 With an immaculate charm that cannot be defaced." 
 
 37 
 
THE DEDICATION OF THE 
 
 GOETHE-SCHILLER MEMORIAL 
 
 Golden Gale Park, August 11, 1901. 
 
 On behalf of the citizens of San Francisco, I accept 
 this beautiful group of statuary from our German- 
 American citizens, whose thoughtful generosity I desire, 
 in the name of all our people to gratefully acknowledge. 
 
 This gift will suggest many things to the casual 
 observer who seeks these shades for recreation. He 
 will realize that San Francisco is a little world in itself. 
 Men from every land have made it their home. They 
 bring their culture and their skill as contributions to the 
 city of which they have become by right of citizenship 
 an active and patriotic part. Thus do we possess the 
 spirit of every land and proudly boast of our cosmo- 
 politan character. 
 
 Provincialism alone is a stranger within our gates. 
 Liberality of thought and toleration of the views and 
 the customs of others have promoted that freedom and 
 fellowship which distinguish us even among American 
 cities. 
 
 Kobert Louis Stevenson says of San Francisco that it 
 is the " smeltingpot of the races " — where the gold is 
 separated from the dross. 
 
 39 
 
A new country has the splendid advantage of enjoying 
 the thought and the work of all men who have gone 
 before. We can select and appropriate the best. As 
 the poet has written, we are "the heir of all the ages in 
 the foremost files of time." From these, our possessions, 
 the common property of mankind, we can draw at will. 
 From the exalted position which it is our good fortune 
 to thus occupy, native genius may soar, and on the sure 
 foundation of past accomplishment, native skill may 
 safely build. 
 
 To appropriate, however, the work of other men or 
 even to take the legacy which is ours, without expressing 
 obligation to our benefactors, would prove us selfish and 
 unworthy. So we are assembled to pay a tribute, which 
 is the due of genius, to the master minds of Germany, 
 Goethe and Schiller. 
 
 They are part of our legacy. They are ours today 
 because we make them ours; their genius was so trans- 
 cendant that they belong to the world. But let us not 
 deceive ourselves, for, just as the father is proud of his 
 sons, so prouder today than all is the land of their birth 
 and its sons. Let us bow to the superior claims of 
 German nationality. 
 
 You, who came from Germany, speak for your native 
 land, and I for our cosmopolitan city; but who shall 
 speak for Art, for Poetry and for Science? Who shall 
 speak for the glory of mankind? Who is able to fit- 
 tingly express the whole debt of gratitude we owe to 
 mortals such as these? 
 
 Yet little did they dream, in the wildest imaginings 
 of Fancy's flight, that they would be honored by a mon- 
 ument in bronze by the far shores of the Pacific. But 
 be it known to the lasting credit of their fellow-country- 
 
 40 
 
men who have distinguished themselves in the upbuild- 
 ing of California, that, although separated by sea 
 and continent from the Fatherland, they have, during 
 their pilgrimage, carried within their hearts, as the ark 
 covenant, their love and reverence for their country's 
 greatest names. 
 
 The highest criticism, as well as the popular regard, 
 attest the inspired genius and personal worth of Goethe 
 and Schiller. They should have our unreserved venera- 
 tion. As men and as masters, they loved each other. 
 This portrait group shall therefore stand for friendship 
 as well as fame. It will inspire our youth. It will adorn 
 our Park as long as time shall spare it from the ravages 
 of decay. Here, embowered among the flowers so dear to 
 Goethe, it will serve to awaken our love of literature and 
 our appreciation of its most brilliant exponents. Well 
 has it been said that the history of literature is the 
 history of the human mind — ''the thoughts of thinking 
 souls." Carlyle says of Goethe that he was the most 
 notable literary man for the last hundred years, and that 
 he was his chosen hero among them all. " Out of his 
 books the world rises imaged once more as Godlike, the 
 workmanship and temple of a God." 
 
 We can best understand his position when we recall 
 how dear to us is our Shakespeare, who has peopled our 
 minds as with living men and women, representing 
 every human passion and emotion. He, their prototype, 
 was venerated by Goethe and Schiller, and should stand 
 by their side. Shakespeare should have also the homage 
 of our city. 
 
 Then let this monument be but the beginning of San 
 Francisco's tribute to the great minds of the world. Let 
 this Concert Valley be a Temple of Fame. Then will 
 
 41 
 
the blooms of flowers and the voice of music, on every 
 holiday, bespeak our gratitude and praise! 
 
 We thank our German fellow-citizens for having sug- 
 gested the thought and given it such beautiful expres- 
 sion in this work of their great sculptor, Eietschel, thus 
 wedding Art, Literature and the Fatherland in a com- 
 mon memorial. 
 
 Apart from the conspicuous services which our citi- 
 zens of German extraction have rendered this country 
 in every field of human activity, why should not the 
 German Fatherland have a memorial? "We have been 
 accustomed to boast of our Anglo-Saxon civilization, 
 and it is true the land of Shakespeare has given much 
 to the world; but back of England were the races who 
 have given that country its name as well as its distinc- 
 tion — the Angles and the Saxons — who were German 
 tribes and whose superior prowess wrested the possession 
 of that country from the native Britons. 
 
 So, whatever benefits have been conferred upon 
 America by Anglo-Saxon civilization, its origin must 
 be sought in the ancestors of the men and women who 
 here today glorify the greatest minds which the Teu- 
 tonic people have developed. 
 
 It is the blending of all peoples that has given 
 supremacy to America, and therefore it is in a true 
 American sense I acknowledge, on this occasion, our 
 obligation and speak our thanks. 
 
 42 
 
ADDRESS OF WELCOME 
 
 TO PRESIDENT McKINLEY 
 
 In the Grand Nave of the Union Depot, San Francisco, May 14, 1901 
 
 President William McKinley officially arrived in San 
 Francisco on the afternoon of May 14, accompanied by 
 his Cabinet. After a street parade, they were formally 
 received at the Union Depot, where a public reception 
 was held. 
 
 Mayor Phelan's address was as follows : 
 Mr. President and Distinguished Guests: 
 
 The people of San Francisco bid yon cordial and 
 patriotic welcome. They have for many days been 
 making ready for your coming, and now enjoy the 
 pleasure and the honor of receiving and entertaining 
 their President — the President of the Kepublic of which 
 they are a devoted part, and in whose greatness and 
 glory they are proud to share. 
 
 We feel that San Francisco is indeed one of the 
 nation's capitals. Our city not only renders municipal 
 service for its inhabitants and fulfills the purposes of a 
 metropolis as the chief city of a great State, but its 
 position is better defined as the principal port of the 
 
 43 
 
United States on the Pacific ocean. It is, therefore, Mr. 
 President, in a peculiar sense, yonr city as well as ours. 
 It belongs to the country. 
 
 As late as 1848, however, Daniel Webster said that 
 California, on account of her remoteness, could never 
 be expected to accept laws from Congress. But it is a 
 matter of history that she eagerly joined the Union of 
 States, and you know, Mr. President, having just crossed 
 the broad continent, that you were never absent for an 
 hour from the seat of government. We are no longer 
 remote. It is true that forty long days elapsed after our 
 admission before we were apprised of the event; but 
 invention and enterprise, which Webster failed to fore- 
 see, have since that day distanced the revolution of the 
 earth, and we can now, in point of time, anticipate Con- 
 gress itself in the passage of its acts. By the grace of 
 electricity, our western position puts us in the vanguard 
 of the sun, and by the awakening of the Pacific we have 
 become a center, whereas we were an outpost. 
 
 During your visit we shall show you how San Fran- 
 cisco in the gentler pursuits of life has kept pace with 
 the social, educational and material development of the 
 country. From the summit of Mt. Tamalpais, almost 
 3000 feet above the sea, you will be invited to survey 
 our city, bay and tributary country; our great park, 
 extending to the shores of the ocean, shall bid you 
 thither; our tables, bearing the fullness of the land, will 
 yield you refreshment; our schools and universities shall 
 exhibit to you the progress of learning, and monuments 
 in honor of labor and in commemoration of valor await 
 your dedication. * 
 
 And now to the object of your visit, Mr. President: 
 
 The city which constructed the Olympia and the 
 
 44 
 
Oregon claims the privilege which you have graciously 
 granted of giving to the sea a battleship which shall 
 bear the name of your own State — the illustrious com- 
 monwealth of Ohio — and it is our sincere wish and 
 expectation that her achievements shall be worthy of the 
 exploits of her sister ships, as well as the unusual and 
 auspicious ceremony of her christening. 
 
 We trust that these many evidences of the growth and 
 power of this American city, the creation of the pioneers 
 and the pride of their descendants, representing a span 
 of a little more than fifty years, shall be pleasing in 
 your eyes. What we have and what we are is at the 
 command of our common country, a part of its posses- 
 sions, a fragment, perhaps, of its glory. In this spirit, 
 Mr. President, you are welcome to it all; and in a more 
 personal sense, I ask you for yourself and Mrs. McKin- 
 ley and the members of your party, to now accept the 
 hospitality of the hearts and homes of the people of 
 San Francisco. 
 
 The President's response was as follows: 
 Mb. Mayor and Fellow-citizens: 
 
 I wish I might command fitting words of response to 
 the gracious and beautiful welcome extended to me in 
 behalf of all the people of San Francisco by your elo- 
 quent and distinguished chief magistrate. It is true, as 
 he has well said, we needed no formal or official welcome 
 after the demonstration of today; and repeated again 
 tonight as we drove to this assembly hall. I can only in 
 a single word express the very great satisfaction it is to 
 us that you, irrespective of creed or politics or nationality 
 or race, give greeting to the President of the United 
 States. (Applause.) We heard today no note but that 
 
 45 
 
of national joy; no song but that of patriotism; no 
 music but for the Union of the States. We looked upon 
 the faces of hope and contentment, and I assure you this 
 splendid manifestation of the feeling of the people will 
 give me encouragement for the great responsibilities 
 which have been committed for a time to my care. (Ap- 
 plause. ) 
 
 Nothing has pleased me more in all this demonstra- 
 tion than the greeting which I received from the work- 
 ingmen of this city from their shops and your streets 
 today. I was glad to be welcomed by them; by the 
 Grand Army of the Republic; by my old comrades 
 of the Twenty-third Ohio, and by all the people, who 
 now have but one flag, one hope, one faith, one destiny. 
 (Great and long-continued applause.) 
 
 46 
 
INTRODUCTORY ADDRESS 
 
 By Mayor James D. Phelan at the Citizens' Memorial Services, 
 Held on the Day of the Funeral of William McKinley, Late 
 President of the United States, Mechanics' Pavilion, San Fran- 
 cisco, Thursday, September 19, 1901. 
 
 A sad mission has called us together. Our city is 
 bowed in grief. We mourn the loss of our President. 
 But recently he was with us, beloved and honored of all 
 men, and now he is lying low, the victim of a cruel and 
 cowardly crime which humiliates the Republic and dis- 
 graces humanity. But this hour is sacred to sorrow, 
 and resentment yields to the tender emotions which 
 have brought us here. 
 
 We are a joyous people. We celebrate holidays and 
 welcome distinguished guests with garlanded streets 
 and decorated houses; and so did we go out dutifully, 
 it seems but yesterday, to greet the President of the 
 United States, when, accompanied by his Cabinet, in 
 all the power of his position, he honored our city by a 
 visit. I say, dutifully did we go out to greet him, but 
 well do we remember how duty was enthusiastically 
 transmuted, by his simple presence, into the sweetest 
 offices of love! Our country's chosen chief at once 
 became our friend, as we became his champion. Ah! 
 
 47 
 
too brief a time did he linger with us, but long enough 
 to awaken in every honest breast the sincerest appre- 
 ciation of his virtues and his patriotism. 
 
 But, now, he is gone forever. His last kindly speech 
 is spoken: "Good by all. It is God's way. Let His 
 will, not ours, be done." 
 
 Good-by, William McKinley ! 
 
 No more, my friends, shall his inspiring words fall 
 upon our delighted ears; nor shall his eyes ever again 
 reflect the love he bore his fellowman; nor shall his 
 benignant face picture again for us the unfeigned joy 
 with which he beheld the reciprocal devotion of a happy 
 and prosperous people. 
 
 He is dead, and we are assembled to honor his 
 memory. Let us strive to do it worthily. Our feeble 
 expression is burdened, however, with the weight of 
 sorrow; each man's house is a house of mourning; but 
 each fireside shall be a Temple of Fame and a strong- 
 hold of Patriotism! Our people shall, in their heart- 
 offerings of this day, pledge themselves to the God of 
 Nations that the lesson of the life and death of William 
 McKinley shall not be lost, and that the gain in an 
 aroused love of country, which would have been so 
 pleasing in his eyes, shall be equal to the magnitude of 
 the sacrifice. Let this be our consolation. 
 
 We cannot recall the past. The President is dead; 
 William McKinley is no more; San Francisco, loyal 
 and loving, mourns passionately at his grave; but our 
 Country survives and is made more sacred to us still by 
 the blood of its martyred President and the tears of an 
 afflicted people. 
 
 48 
 
DEBATE ON THE CHINESE QUESTION 
 
 With Imperial Chinese Consul Ho Yow, at the Unitarian Club, 
 San Francisco, Cal. t November 25, 1901. 
 
 Speech of Mayor James D* Phelan, 
 
 (Stenographically Reported.) 
 
 Mr. President, and gentlemen of the Unitarian Club : 
 I would have much preferred to have followed in the 
 course of this debate, after having heard the arguments 
 advanced by the distinguished gentlemen on the other 
 side. I came here with feelings of expectation and 
 interest in the presentation of the case from the point 
 of view of those who are the proponents of Chinese 
 immigration, because, as your President has said, the 
 settled opinion of California during the last twenty years 
 has been favorable to the exclusion of the Chinese from 
 these shores. It may be said that we have been brought 
 up upon that doctrine; we have absorbed it. During 
 the last week there were abundant opportunities for 
 further absorption; and hence, when we find men 
 seriously opposing the trend of public opinion, or we 
 may say, what is the settled policy of the country, our 
 interest and our expectations are awakened. 
 
 49 
 
I am also glad that here tonight is the author of the 
 Geary Law, whose Act will come before Congress at its 
 next session for re-enactment. 1 am sure that he can 
 enlighten you on the one side, and the Imperial Chinese 
 Consul, Mr. Ho Yow, on the other. 
 
 For my part, my interest in the subject has come 
 from my residence in California. I have, in common 
 with you all, lived here probably during the entire anti- 
 Chinese agitation, but I do not go back, perhaps, as far 
 as many of you. 
 
 The Burlingame Treaty was 'negotiated in 1868. At 
 that time there was a disposition, I am told, in this 
 state, to receive with open arms the immigration of 
 Chinese, because we were a sparsely settled country, 
 and it was believed that their capacity for hard work on 
 our railroads, in our fields and in our mines would help 
 greatly in the development of the young state. But 
 you will recall that very soon after that, within ten or 
 twelve years, there was a marked change of sentiment. 
 
 You will recollect that about 1878 or 1879 there was 
 a movement called Kearnyism, which was an opprobri- 
 ous reference to a political movement of real significance, 
 behind which were a very large majority of the people 
 of this state. Kearnyism simply stood in those days 
 for an aggressive opposition to Chinese coolieism. The 
 shibboleth of the campaign was that "The Chinese 
 must go!" but it really meant that the Chinese should 
 not come, because in those few years following the 
 ratification of the Burlingame Treaty no less than 
 75,000 Chinese had come to California. 
 
 The people saw at once — they seemed to realize it in 
 a night, so spontaneous was the movement — that large 
 numbers of our citizens of the Caucasian race, who had 
 
 50 
 
pioneered and begun the development of the country, 
 were displaced in almost every field of trade and em- 
 ployment — the common laborer as well as the skilled 
 artisan — and men, women and children marched the 
 streets really hungry for bread. They could not get em- 
 ployment, and in the fever heat which followed that 
 agitation, the new constitution, so far as the constitution 
 of a state might embrace such subjects, discouraging the 
 employment of Chinese, was carried in the face of tre- 
 mendous opposition from the conservative classes, who 
 had overlooked the Chinese question for the moment and 
 believed that the new constitution involved the confisca- 
 tion of their property; and a Mayor of San Francisco was 
 elected at that time by an overwhelming vote, almost 
 upon the same issue. 
 
 Kearnyism was a mere passing and emotional politi- 
 cal movement; and yet it had very deep significance, so 
 much so that James Bryce in his very serious and 
 exhaustive work, " The American Commonwealth," 
 gives two chapters to it; and as the result of that 
 movement publishes in his appendix a copy of the Con- 
 stitution of the State of California. 
 
 Those were the conditions which existed at that time. 
 Congress, obedient to what was clearly the wish of this 
 state, represented by numerical majority, enacted in 
 1882 the first exclusion law, and in 1892 the law was 
 re-enacted. In 1894 the State Department negotiated a 
 treaty with China, embracing all the provisions of the 
 Geary Act, referring to the exclusion of Chinese. So 
 we have, with the consent of the Chinese government, 
 today a law forbidding the immigration into this country 
 of Chinese laborers. 
 
 The merchant class, students, educators and travelers 
 
 51 
 
are admitted, and it was the clear intention of the law 
 simply to bar all Chinese coolies who, I am informed, 
 come here principally from the province embracing 
 Canton, a comparatively small province of China. The 
 law was directed, then, as we first contend, simply at 
 the immigration of coolies. 
 
 There is certainly no question as to the power of a 
 state to exclude an undesirable immigration. That is 
 founded in natural law. It is based, of course, upon 
 the right of a state to preserve itself. It is the judge, 
 as it were, of the qualifications of its own members; 
 and because we exclude the Chinese it does not follow 
 that this country is actuated and moved merely by con- 
 siderations of the agitation in California, or by the 
 demands of its people, who are most exposed to the 
 dangers of Asiatic immigration; the Congress of the 
 United States has enacted immigration laws excluding 
 the pauper and the contract labor of Europe, and those 
 laws are very strictly enforced, at the behest of the 
 whole country. 
 
 On the eastern seaboard today in every custom house 
 immigrants from the old lands are interrogated as to 
 their ability to support themselves, and close investiga- 
 tion is made as to whether they are brought here under 
 contract, no matter how skilled or competent they may 
 be, or how eligible they may be to American citizenship, 
 they are sent back, because the settled policy of this 
 country, irrespective of the Chinese question, is to 
 exclude the contract and the pauper labor of the Old 
 World. 
 
 I might rest the case here by saying that you will all 
 agree that contract and pauper labor should be excluded 
 and that that, necessarily, would embrace the exclusion 
 
 52 
 
of the Chinese immigrants, because I hold that almost 
 without exception the Chinese coolie comes within this 
 classification. Their immigration is always assisted. 
 They are not a people who migrate voluntarily. They 
 come here under contracts. They come here under the 
 patronage — I may say, in one sense, if not a technical 
 sense — the ownership of the six Chinese companies of 
 California, who exercise a paternal interest over their 
 people who, emigrating from that remote country to this, 
 are hardly able to care for themselves. Their services 
 are farmed out. You can contract for large numbers of 
 Chinese and have them brought here, provided the bars 
 are let down, as they are brought today to Mexico to 
 work upon mines and farms; and then they are returned, 
 if you please, or they are sent hither and thither. 
 
 We know the poverty that pinches China. We know 
 that people there work for a "small pittance, even arti- 
 sans or skilled laborers receiving not more than eight 
 or ten dollars a month. And I am told it is shown in 
 the reports of the United States Minister, John Barrett, 
 of Siam, who gave a statistical table as to wages in a 
 recent number of a magazine of all the common laborers 
 and agriculturists — and it is claimed that the majority 
 of the Chinese are merely common laborers and agri- 
 culturists — receive not more than a dollar and a half or 
 two dollars in our money per month, in China, where 
 they must find themselves. And hence, it is an induce- 
 ment to them, and to those who contract for their labor, 
 and to the companies who traffic in the business of 
 immigration, to bring them here where they can earn a 
 large sum of money, comparatively, and enough to 
 enable them, if need be, to go back, which they invaria- 
 bly do, 
 
 53 
 
There is a peculiarity of the Chinese — his attachment 
 to native land is so strong, that he always intends to 
 return. It is a part of the religious belief of the people 
 that in order to insure eternal rest, their bones even 
 must rest in the land of their birth. And hence, when 
 they are brought here it is with the understanding that 
 they shall be returned; and if they die here that the 
 mortal part of them shall be returned. 
 
 In Hawaii today, I am told, there are 25,000 Chinese, 
 and the number is diminishing at the rate of five hun- 
 dred per month, because they are receiving a dollar a 
 d*ay there to work upon the plantations, and when they 
 accumulate a thousand dollars they think that it is a 
 fortune; and indeed it is in the Flowery Kingdom, and 
 nothing can keep them in the Hawaiian Islands, where 
 life is so attractive, under a tropical sky, to which they 
 have been inured, and to which they are accustomed. 
 They will not remain, but back they will go. 
 
 The state, having the right to exclude, it follows 
 simply that the question before us resolves itself into 
 this: Are the Chinese a desirable population? Are the 
 Chinese desirable as citizens of this country? In order 
 to answer that it might be necessary to explain what 
 this country is; its purpose and its destiny. That 
 would be, indeed, a long story. But it may clear things 
 to state that this is no ordinary country; that this land 
 was settled by men seeking freedom. They came, I will 
 not say voluntarily, in one sense, from the old lands, 
 they came because the conditions of life were such that 
 they could not endure them. They would have remained 
 in England and injreland, in France and in Germany, 
 if the conditions were favorable to their happiness and 
 prosperity; but the conditions were so hard that under 
 
 54 
 
compulsion, which bore upon their minds and upon 
 their souls; loving freedom, they came to this land to 
 establish a republic; and the cornerstone of that republic 
 was the equality of its citizens. All men were to be 
 equal with respect to their rights before the law; they 
 were to have freedom of locomotion, to go and come 
 where they pleased; they were to have the freedom of 
 the press, and of speech and of assembly; they were, 
 in fine, to have all those things which had been denied 
 them in the old country. 
 
 Under the stimulus of freedom they have become a 
 great and a prosperous people. The growth of the 
 United States is phenomenal, and pari passu with their 
 growth in population has been the growth of civiliza- 
 tion and civic rights. 
 
 This country is a shining example, and will so remain 
 through all history, of a marvelous development, not 
 only in material matters, but in political, social and 
 civic matters, which will cause it to stand out forever 
 as a beacon and a guide. 
 
 This country is not like South Africa, if you please; 
 it is not like Central Africa; it is not like a land which 
 is abandoned, as it were, to the mere development of the 
 material resources of the country, to become tributary 
 to a home government. It is a nation. It is not a 
 colony to make contributions, as it was designed to be 
 by England. It is an independent country, working 
 out its own destiny, and we must never for a moment 
 separate the social and the political interests of the 
 people from the development of the soil, and of manu- 
 factures. 
 
 I can well imagine an argument being made by which 
 it would appear to the short-sighted that a cheap class 
 
 55 
 
of labor would serve, as we once believed it would, 
 about the time of the negotiation of the Burlingame 
 Treaty, to produce wealth and material greatness, by 
 taking coolie labor, willing, eager and able to work, 
 putting it in the hard places, in the hills and in the 
 valleys and in the swamps; reclaiming the lands and 
 harvesting the crops; opening the treasures locked in 
 the secret places of the mountains, so that all this 
 wealth would pour out and be appropriated by the 
 American citizen proper, who would serve as an over- 
 seer in this great plantation of California, and live on 
 the bounty and the work of others. 
 
 That was the spirit which appeared here, and it was 
 a mistaken spirit and a false policy, the same spirit and 
 policy which brought the slaves here in the beginning 
 of the life of this republic — a great error which has 
 been extravagantly paid for by the expenditure of money 
 and blood, which, probably, never can be recovered. 
 Never can the scars of the Civil War be fully healed. 
 Never can the waste which followed that war be fully 
 restored. 
 
 It has been the policy, the popular theory of academic 
 gentlemen, to regard labor simply by its capacity for 
 work. If we can bring here from China or elsewhere 
 a large number of willing and capable servants who 
 will do this disagreeable work for us, and we can bene- 
 fit by their labor, then in that event, the state forsooth 
 is prosperous. But we cannot, under American institu- 
 tions, and in consonance with American ideals, segregate 
 the laboring class and regard them only in the light of 
 their capacity to work. I think that is the main consid- 
 eration which actuates the American people in resisting 
 coolie immigration. 
 
 56 
 
The coolie cannot be assimilated into the mass of the 
 American people. The American people coosist largely 
 of the Caucasian race. They assimilate; the people of 
 Europe assimilate, and as a result there is a strong and a 
 composite race known as the American people, or, as 
 Bayard Taylor says is his National Ode: 
 
 "In one strong race all races here unite; 
 Tongues melt in hers, hereditary foemen 
 Forget their sword and slogan, kith and clan; 
 
 'Twas glory once to be a Koman; 
 She makes it glory now to be a man ! " 
 
 The Chinese are an undesirable immigration because 
 they are incapable of that assimilation. I do not know 
 that it will be seriously contended that they can be 
 assimilated and moulded into the mass of the American 
 people, ready and able to take up the service of citizen- 
 ship and the family life, supporting schools and colleges, 
 and churches and theaters, advancing the arts and 
 sciences, and mingling with us in our political activities. 
 I do not know that you, in your minds, imagine that the 
 Chinese in a thousand or two thousand years would 
 ever be able to arrive at that stage by which we could 
 regard them as fellow-citizens, the same in mind and 
 the same in thought. We know that when the Euro- 
 peans assimilate it is only a generation, or at most two 
 generations, which must pass in order to wipe out, as it 
 were, and obliterate the original identity of their fore- 
 fathers. 
 
 We have lived with the Chinese in peace and quiet 
 ever since the enactment of the first exclusion law in 
 1882. That is twenty years. They remain the same 
 unchanged people, showing the same racial character- 
 istics, born of centuries and centuries of isolation, be- 
 
 57 
 
cause they are the oldest and most ancient of people, 
 and, to quote Joaquin Miller, of an " effete and mouldy 
 land." They have remained the same, and resisted all 
 change and innovation. Their religion, their laws, their 
 commerce, their teachers, their books, have remained 
 the same for ages and ages, and no traveler or historian 
 can record the time when these things were not. They 
 have never been influenced by a civilization which has 
 grown up and been developed all around them. They 
 are a hermit nation, and they have been inured for cen- 
 turies to those peculiarities of race which appeal to us 
 so strongly in the Chinatown of San Francisco; making 
 them here, after thirty-five years of residence, still a 
 permanently foreign element. * 
 
 If you attempt to introduce a foreign element into the 
 body or into the body politic, it yields not nourishment, 
 it only obstructs the system; it is inimical to health and 
 ultimately will accomplish dissolution and death. 
 
 We must assimilate the Chinese, or we must bar them 
 from admission to this state. I claim that they are non- 
 assimilative. I claim that it has been demonstrated by 
 our own experience with them and has been demon- 
 strated by the experience of other nations. In spite of 
 their living in the civilized world, they retain their 
 original concepts of religion, their ideas of morality and 
 their social forms. If the Chinese were an assimilative 
 race, I do not think that anybody would be here to 
 oppose their free coming to this country. I think if we 
 believed that two or three generations might probably 
 cause them to be assimilated, by intermingling with us, 
 that we would look fpr a modification of the exclusion 
 law, and allow them to come in small numbers in order 
 that the experiment might be made. 
 
 58 
 
But the experiment has been made in the State of 
 California. There has been in this state no law forbid- 
 ding the intermarriage of whites and Chinese ever since 
 the beginning of the existence of the state, until this 
 last year, when the legislature enacted a law adding the 
 word "Mongolian,, to that of u Negro and mulatto," 
 forbidding intermarriage; and notwithstanding that fact, 
 the very few marriages that have taken place have 
 attracted no attention. I am informed by the Police 
 Department and by the Chinese Mission, with whom I 
 have communicated, that where there were a few of such 
 marriages, the issue thereof have invariably been 
 degenerates. 
 
 So we are confronted by a question of assimilation. 
 Is it possible for them to assimilate, physically? I say 
 it is practically impossible, and it has been so demon- 
 strated. Is it possible for them politically and socially 
 to assimiliate with our people and become a part of a 
 a homogeneous population? In matters of thought, in 
 the appreciation of the blessings of liberty, in adherence 
 to our institutions, in an allegiance to our country, in a 
 devotion to the flag, fighting its battles, and advancing 
 its interests, we know that the Chinese are indifferent; 
 but their simple purpose is to work, work and inces- 
 santly work, respecting no holidays, having no limita- 
 tions of time, having no family life; nothing but 
 ceaseless and unremitting toil. And against the com- 
 petition of men coming here without wives, appetites or 
 aspirations, having none of the burdens which pertain 
 to our western civilization, neither civic duty nor family 
 life, American progress is impossible. The Chinese 
 subsist on very little, they sleep anywhere, their stand- 
 ard of living is entirely different from ours, and thus 
 
 59 
 
equipped, they are industrially formidable, and against 
 them our men cannot compete and survive. Our men 
 will, if the Chinese are admitted freely, endeavor, if 
 you please, to meet that competition, and down will go 
 the standard of living until it will reach a point when, 
 in obedience to the law of self-preservation, as history 
 teaches, the people would rise up, and by extra-legal 
 methods resist the invasion. 
 
 It is the part of statesmanship, not only to act wisely 
 in time, to see the dangers, but to take the steps which 
 would save us from such a consequence. 
 
 You cannot imagine in this country, which, after all, 
 is ruled by majorities, the people submitting for a 
 moment to the free coming of an immigration which is 
 contract and pauper in character, which is below the 
 standard of their life, which is non-assimilative. I can 
 not imagine that the people would submit to it for any 
 long period of time. And, knowing that to be true, and 
 knowing the basis of their opposition to be reasonable 
 and just, it would be certainly unwise on the part of 
 Congress not to re-enact the law. Congress probably 
 will re-enact the law. It will do so for the reasons I 
 have stated. It will do so because it is the settled 
 policy of the country, and because China has accepted 
 that policy, and declared, in the treaty of 1894, that on 
 account of the antagonism, as strong now as then, 
 " China desires to prevent the emigration of its citizens 
 to the United States." 
 
 We are quite willing to trade with China, and we 
 would exceedingly regret that our domestic policy of 
 exclusion should interfere with the freedom of our 
 trade. But if it comes to be a matter of choice between 
 trade and the free admission of coolies, we would cer- 
 
 60 
 
tainly sacrifice our trade. But the statistics show that 
 our trade has increased during the period of exclusion. 
 In 1880 our imports and exports aggregated, according 
 to a recent consular report by Consul-General Goode- 
 now, twenty-eight millions of dollars. Today they 
 stand at thirty-eight millions. We rank second only to 
 England, and we sell more goods'than any other country 
 to China. Our commercial relations with her are en- 
 tirely satisfactory, and do not seem to be affected, except 
 advantageously, by the exclusion of the Chinese. 
 
 Our diplomatic relations are most friendly, and may 
 they continue to remain so. We have been of some 
 service to*China, which is not unappreciated. We have 
 in the past been able by our influence to arrest the traffic 
 in opium, which has been such a blight to that people — a 
 vice which they have carried with them in their migra- 
 tions. We have done everything that a civilized nation 
 might do and yet preserve the dignity of its own labor 
 and safeguard its own institutions. 
 
 America has dignified labor, and must preserve its 
 dignity. America has attracted people here from 
 Europe who are an assimilative people, and has given 
 them land to culivate and work to perform, which they 
 have done with exceeding skill; it has conferred upon 
 them rights, and it is the moral and bounden duty of 
 the country to protect them in those rights if they are 
 invaded, and we claim that they are invaded, by tolerat- 
 ing the coming of a servile and non-assimilative race. 
 
 There is one point more, and that is all in the con- 
 sideration of this question that I care to speak of now. 
 Whether we regard it as a race, labor or as a political 
 question, there is but one great thought which should 
 govern all patriotic citizens, and that is the fact that we 
 
 61 
 
are a republic, governed by majorities, and anything 
 that would tend to lower the standard of our popula- 
 tion would strike a blow at the perpetuity of our gov- 
 ernment and the success of its republican institutions. 
 The presence of the Chinese and their free coming would 
 unfailingly lower the standard of the population, and 
 though we are urged by considerations of commerce and 
 trade to cultivate friendly relations with all peoples, we 
 cannot in this matter be moved; we must not look upon 
 the case in any other light than that of the great Amer- 
 ican question, in which our institutions are involved, in 
 which our political integrity is involved, and in which 
 the civilization which has been builded by the heroes 
 and martyrs of the past is involved, and whose preser- 
 vation for future generations is at stake. It shall not 
 be allowed to pass away, nor to deteriorate by contact 
 with any inferior race or by the infiltration of Asiatic 
 coolies. It cannot be done. It is contrary to those 
 principles of self-preservation and patriotism which are 
 imbedded in us, and which, when we once understand 
 them, we shall assert. 
 
 You, members of the Unitarian Club, merchants and 
 professional gentlemen, I do not believe feel the pinch 
 of necessity. The pressure of Chinese immigration falls 
 immediately upon the working classes of society, in 
 every trade and vocation, because Chinese are skilled 
 and capable of being skilled, although the majority of 
 them be common laborers; but you will feel, however 
 indirectly, that pinch of necessity just as soon as the 
 burden falls fairly upon labor. Labor is the foundation 
 upon which our American superstructure is built. The 
 common people of this country stand for the govern 
 ment, as well as for the industrial fabric, and it is our 
 patriotic duty to protect them. (Applause.) 
 
 62 
 
VALEDICTORY ADDRESS 
 
 To the Honorable the Board of Supervisors: 
 
 It has been customary for the retiring Mayor to 
 make a brief statement of the condition of the munici- 
 pality during his administration. As I have sent mes- 
 sages to the Board of Supervisors on the occasion of 
 my inauguration on three different occasions, I will 
 now confine myself more particularly to the last two 
 years, under the charter government. 
 
 When, five years ago, I assumed the duties of the 
 office of Mayor, and for three years thereafter, the city 
 lived under what was known as the Consolidation Act, 
 which consisted of various statutes which had been 
 passed from time to time by the Legislature, and the 
 Governor of the State exercised certain powers over the 
 municipality in the appointment of boards or commis- 
 sions. Every Legislature interfered with the munici- 
 pality, creating new offices and inflicting upon our 
 people unreasonable and unjust legislation. On four 
 different occasions our citizens had tried to throw off the 
 legislative yoke by proposing freeholders' charters, 
 which, for inherent defects, failed at the polls. I had 
 the honor, immediately after my first election, to 
 appoint a convention of one hundred, a thoroughly rep- 
 resentative body, which proceeded to draft an advisory 
 charter and to nominate a board of freeholders to give 
 it legal expression. 
 
The nominees of this convention were elected, and 
 the charter they framed, after having been voted on by 
 the people and approved by the Legislature, became, 
 on the 8th day of January, 1900, the organic law of the 
 city. From that moment San Francisco was practically 
 exempt from legislative interference in its municipal 
 affairs and became a free city. 
 
 That charter has now had a trial of two years. 
 The outgoing administration has had, therefore, the 
 responsibility of inaugurating it and defending its pro- 
 visions when attacked in the courts, of interpreting it 
 in daily practice and of establishing precedents. While 
 the charter is not free from defects common to all 
 human documents, which may now be cured by amend- 
 ment if necessary, still it has proved its worth and con- 
 ferred innumerable benefits upon the city. It has, as 
 we have seen, freed us from the Legislature and from 
 interference by the Governor. Many of the other great 
 cities of the country still look to the Legislature for 
 their laws, whereas San Francisco has advanced beyond 
 that stage. It has introduced a civil service system, 
 which applies, under the decision of the courts, to all 
 offices, boards and commissions, except the Sheriff, 
 Treasurer, County Clerk, Recorder, Coroner and As- 
 sessor, which are called county offices. 
 
 This condition arose from the failure of constitutional 
 amendment 8J, article xi, to mention, in addition to 
 " terms and compensation " therein expressed, the word 
 "qualification." That is to say, according to the 
 Supreme Court, it was not competent for the charter to 
 require the subordinates of county officers to have cer- 
 tain qualifications, to be demonstrated by civil service 
 examination. This was unfortunate, and can be reme- 
 
 64 
 
died by proposing a constitutional amendment, which 
 no doubt will be done. The civil service commissioners 
 have industriously and conscientiously classified the civil 
 service of the city and have held numerous examina- 
 tions, as a result of which they have prepared eligible 
 lists and certified clerks for the several offices and de- 
 partments amenable to the law. 
 
 There are in the city government, in round numbers, 
 3400 positions, and over 60 per cent of this number is 
 subject to civil service. If we include 1064 employes 
 of the school department, who really hold under a 
 civil service of their own, the percentage would be about 
 90 per cent. It is accepted by all disinterested officials 
 who have had experience with the system, that it not 
 only promotes efficiency but protects a public officer, 
 who with a trained staff enters upon the discharge of his 
 duties. It confers an equal benefit upon the men who 
 are employed and who are protected, so long as they 
 faithfully perform their work. I trust that this reform 
 which has been so successfully begun, will be protected 
 by the incoming administration against the assaults of 
 its enemies. 
 
 The charter has next in order provided an economical 
 and progressive government. Under the old law, there 
 was practically no limit upon taxation, and the rate for 
 state and city and county purposes has within the past 
 seven years been as high as $2.15, against a rate this 
 year of $1,556, of which $1,076 is for city purposes and 
 the balance for state. The charter limits taxation to 
 one dollar for all city purposes, except provisions for 
 the maintenance of parks and for interest and sinking 
 funds. This is an organic check upon extravagance, and 
 when once the funds are apportioned by the budget they 
 
are inviolable and can not be diverted during the year 
 This insures a paid-up government, and prevents defi- 
 cits at the end of each fiscal year — a calamity which 
 visited the city perennially under the old system. 
 
 The amount provided by the budget of June, 1901, 
 for the city was $5,825,100, of which the receipts from 
 other sources than taxation amounted to $1,470,100. 
 Of the revenue from other sources than taxation, the 
 principal items were from the state school fund, $695,- 
 000, and from licenses $470,000. In the year of 1898- 
 1899, before the charter took effect, the amount of 
 licenses collected was $505,082. As the charter abol- 
 ished license taxation on mercantile business, it was 
 expected that there would be a loss on this item of 
 $100,000, whereas it appears that there is a loss of but 
 $35,000. 
 
 The first year under the charter the assessment roll 
 was assumed to be $375,000,000, and the budget pro- 
 vided a sufficient sum — $5,146,700 — to meet the current 
 expenses of the government and allowed about $40,000 
 for improvements; but as a matter of fact the Assessor 
 subsequently returned a roll of $410,000,000, and hence 
 for that year there was a large surplus unappropriated 
 by the budget, which, under the charter rule, passed 
 into the surplus of the following fiscal year, beginning 
 July 1, 1901. With other items, the surplus in the 
 general fund amounted to $297,000. 
 
 Again, in the first fiscal year under the charter, levy 
 was made for interest and sinking funds on bonds which 
 had been voted by the people but were invalidated by 
 the Supreme Court. That money was also available 
 as surplus, and amounted to $225,000, making approx- 
 imately a surplus available for this fiscal year of 
 
 66 
 
$520,000. The board appropriated from this surplus, 
 principally for street improvements and buildings, a sum 
 aggregating $200,000, and for the payment of old claims 
 authorized by constitutional amendment — for which 
 the city creditors had waited for ten years — the sum 
 of $292,500. This included payment of over $100,000 to 
 the teachers of the School Department for back salaries 
 unpaid. So the outgoing administration may justly 
 claim that it has redeemed the credit of the city, and 
 while paying its debts is able to provide for extensive 
 public improvements, without exceeding the dollar 
 limit of taxation. 
 
 The unusual sources of revenue for this current fiscal 
 year are clue, therefore, to the interest and sinking fund 
 accumulation on unissued bonds and the unexpected 
 increase of last year's assessment roll; but, apart from 
 these considerations, as we have seen, it is reasonable 
 to expect more than $350,000 as a surplus in excess of 
 the cost of maintaining the government, which should 
 probably be devoted to public improvements. This is 
 shown in the report of the expert of the Finance Com- 
 mittee, dated December 19, 1901: It is due to the 
 assessment roll in excess of $375,000,000, and to the 
 saving on the hydrant rate. 
 
 The credit of the city, therefore, is first-class. The 
 charter provides for a solvent government. No warrant 
 can be drawn except upon an unexhausted specific 
 appropriation. That provision and the one- twelfth lim- 
 itation compels us to pay as we go and makes economy 
 almost automatic. 
 
 The financial condition of the city, as will be appar- 
 ent from this showing, has never been better. Its net 
 funded debt is only $31,000 — a condition unparalleled 
 
 67 
 
among cities. It has property in lands and buildings, 
 the value of which is estimated at $29,000,000. It is 
 therefore in a position to improve its municipal equip- 
 ment by issuing bonds, which, as required by law, shall 
 run for forty years at a small per cent interest. The 
 proceeds will constitute the city's capital, which, when 
 invested in its business of making a model munici- 
 pality, will come back a hundredfold in the better 
 health, the greater prosperity and the increased num- 
 bers of a happy and contented people. 
 
 Another feature of the charter that has worked 
 admirably is the separation of legislative and executive 
 functions. Under the charter the Board of Super- 
 visors is a legislative body, having no patronage in its 
 gift except its own clerks. Under the Consolidation 
 Act, the board appointed gardeners, police court clerks, 
 prosecuting attorneys, janitors, a fish and game warden 
 and two fire commissioners; and its confirmation was 
 required for the appointment of the license collector 
 and gas inspector. Now, the Board of Supervisors 
 is engaged exclusively in passing laws or ordinances 
 for the government of the city. It raises the revenue, 
 but does not spend it. The Mayor appoints the admin- 
 istrative boards without confirmation, and the subordi- 
 nates are taken from the civil service lists. The 
 responsibility which is conferred upon the Mayor, and 
 his power to remove and appoint, for cause, concentrates 
 authority and makes the government more cohesive. 
 His position is respectable and respected. 
 
 The Consolidation Act divided the city into twelve 
 districts or wards. The charter has obliterated the 
 wards, and provided that the Supervisors, eighteen in 
 number, shall be elected at large. This has sensibly 
 
mproved the personnel of the board, the conventions 
 having the whole city from which to make selections. 
 I desire to say that the high reputation which the 
 Board of Supervisors, serving for the last two years, 
 has enjoyed and the confidence with which it was 
 regarded is a tribute, not only to the character of the 
 men who have had the honor of serving under the 
 charter, but to the charter itself. It was the first Board 
 of Supervisors without rings, and it was the first Board 
 of Supervisors that was practically ever re-elected. The 
 abolition of the ward system and the increase of the 
 number of Supervisors from twelve to eighteen has, 
 by practical experience of the last two years, been dem- 
 onstrated to be a success. The Board of Supervisors has 
 a long list of wise and beneficent acts to its credit, not 
 the least of which is the fixing of laborers' wages and 
 reducing carfare for children. The City Attorney has 
 advised the board, in a recent opinion, that the charter 
 contemplates only the passage of general laws, and dis- 
 countenances special privileges. So hereafter no special 
 privileges should be granted; but the general ordinances 
 should be so amended as to include any public benefit 
 which it may be believed a special privilege could confer 
 upon the city. No citizen should be denied, under like 
 conditions, a privilege which is granted to another. 
 
 I believe that the true meaning of the charter is that 
 the Commissioners are responsible to the Mayor, and 
 that he, as an elective officer, is responsible to the 
 people, and that there should be a loyal co-operation 
 between them; but that the Commissioners should be 
 allowed a wise discretion in putting policies into force 
 and effect, and the Mayor should not interfere, unless 
 there be an abandonment on the part of the Commis- 
 
sioners of the people's declared aud deliberate will, or 
 if they suffer flagrant abuses to creep into the adminis- 
 tration. The charter gives the Mayor the right to 
 attend meetings of the Commissioners and to make sug- 
 gestions. Due weight should be given to his sugges- 
 tions, on account of the importance of his office and of 
 his responsibility to the people. But within their juris- 
 diction, the Boards or Commissions are independent 
 bodies, whose members have terms of office longer in 
 many instances than that of the Mayor himself; they 
 are sworn to uphold the constitution and the laws, and 
 have given bonds for the fidelity of themselves and of 
 their subordinates. They bear no such relation to the 
 Mayor as the Federal Cabinet officers do to the Presi- 
 dent. Cabinet officers are unknown to the constitution, 
 whereas the Boards or Commissions under our munici- 
 pal government are created and derive their authority 
 from our fundamental law. 
 
 The charter has been interpreted in many important 
 particulars. The following comprise the leading cases: 
 
 The first suits instituted in reference to the charter 
 were those entitled Fragley vs. Phelan and Martin vs. 
 the Election Commissioners, filed in the Superior Court 
 in August, 1899. 
 
 Both of these suits prayed for an injunction to re- 
 strain the holding of the first election under the charter, 
 which, uucler article xi of that instrument, was fixed 
 for November 5, 1899. The contention in Fragley vs. 
 Phelan was that the law under which the freeholders 
 and charter elections were held — namely, the Act of 
 March 31, 1897 — was unconstitutional, and that the elec- 
 tions were therefore of no validity. The Superior Court 
 and the Supreme Court sustained the Act in question 
 and upheld the charter elections. 
 
 70 
 
The second suit, Martin vs. Election Commissioners, 
 was brought on behalf of the county officers, so-called, 
 who claimed that the County Government Act, provid- 
 ing for a four years' term for county officers, was not 
 affected by the charter provision reducing the term to 
 two years, and that therefore no election could be held 
 except for municipal officers, as defined in the case of 
 Kahn vs. Sutro. The Supreme Court held, however, 
 that section 8J of article xi of the constitution, adopted 
 in 1896, enlarged the scope of charters so that they 
 might provide for the tenure and compensation of 
 county officers. 
 
 At the installation of the first officers under the 
 charter, n January, 1900, the Board of Health refused 
 voluntarily to surrender their offices to the Charter Board, 
 their contention being that the exercise by them of 
 quarantine powers outside of the limits of the city and 
 county characterized them state officials, and that their 
 powers and tenure could not be affected by a munici- 
 pal charter. After yielding up the office under press- 
 ure, suit in quo warranto was brought for their rein- 
 statement, and decided adversely to them in the 
 Superior Court, and is still pending on appeal in the 
 Supreme Court. 
 
 George F. Maxwell, for many years Secretary of the 
 Fire Commissioners prior to the adoption of the charter, 
 was removed from office by the Charter Commissioners 
 and brought suit for reinstatement, claiming that he 
 was a part of the fire department establishment, whose 
 members were expressly continued in their positions by 
 the charter. Judge Seawell of the Superior Court de- 
 cided adversely to him, and the case is how pending on 
 appeal to the Supreme Court. 
 
 71 
 
In the election contest of Sheehan vs. Scott for the 
 office of Tax Collector, the .provision of the charter 
 requiring five years' residence in the city and county 
 as a qualification for that office was upheld by Judge 
 Sea well, and Scott held not to be entitled to the office. 
 An appeal, which is still pending, has stayed the en- 
 forcement of this judgment. 
 
 Two friendly suits were brought in June, 1900, to 
 test the validity of the bond election held in December, 
 1899, under the general law of the state, authorizing 
 cities to issue bonds for certain purposes — the case of 
 McHugh vs. City involving the question of the validity 
 of the sewer, schoolhouse and hospital bonds, and Fritz 
 vs. City the park extension bonds. It was held by the 
 Supreme Court that the charter provisions relative to 
 the issuing of bonds being in conflict with the general 
 law, the latter ceased to be in force upon the going into 
 effect of the charter, and that it was therefore not 
 within the power of the city to proceed to issue bonds 
 that had been voted under the superseded law. 
 
 The cases of Bauer vs. Quinn and Crowley vs. Freud 
 were instituted in July, 1900, to test the validity of the 
 civil service provisions of the charter. In the latter 
 case, an order was issued by Judge Hebbard restraining 
 the Civil Service Commissioners from holding exam- 
 inations for deputies in the so-called county offices, the 
 suit being intended merely to test the law so far as it 
 affected those offices. 
 
 In the case of Bauer vs. Quinn, the position was 
 taken that the entire article on civil service in the charter 
 was invalid, because it provided for a tenure dependent 
 upon good behavior. This case was decided favorably to 
 civil service in the Superior Court by Judge Cook, 
 
 72 
 
which decision was affirmed, on appeal, by the Supreme 
 Court. In the case of Crowley vs. Freud, however, the 
 Supreme Court, taking a narrow and literal view of 
 section 8J of article xi of the constitution, held that the 
 charter could provide merely for the number and com- 
 pensation of deputies in county offices, but could not 
 control the matter of their qualification, and could not, 
 therefore, impose civil service rules. 
 
 The case of Seyden vs. Freud, instituted on behalf of 
 deputies in the Tax Collector's office, to compel the 
 Civil Service Commission to hold an examination for 
 eligibles for that office in a particular way, was decided 
 by Judge Murasky favorably to the Commission, he 
 holding that its discretion could not be controlled. 
 
 In the case of Wellin vs. Wells, decided by Judge 
 Seawell in March, 1901, it was held that the matter of 
 constructing and repairing school buildings, under plans 
 approved by the Board of Education, was properly 
 committed to the Board of Public Works, under chapter 
 vi, article vii of the charter,,/ 
 
 During the last two years, the Mayor and Supervi- 
 sors have let contracts, after competition, for supplying 
 the several departments with materials, and it is note- 
 worthy that the merchants have, with entire confidence, 
 entered into the competition; that the awards have been 
 made to the lowest bidders, and all bills have been 
 promptly paid. 
 
 Gas rates have been materially reduced, but competi- 
 tion has, daring the year, forced rates in some instances 
 almost to the cost of production. The same is true of 
 electric light. 
 
 The illumination of the streets by the introduction of 
 boulevard lamps with Welsbach burners shows metro- 
 
 73 
 
politan progress. Wires have been laid underground; 
 street sweepings have been transported to the Park. 
 
 After a patient investigation, a valuation of approxi- 
 mately $23,000,000 was placed upon the property of the 
 Spring Valley Works, used in supplying the city with 
 water, and after allowing operating expenses and taxes, 
 a rate was fixed for public and private consumption, 
 which was designed to net the company five per cent 
 upon this valuation. Here is a radical change. In de- 
 termining the company's revenue heretofore, it was 
 customary to allow $60 a year for each hydrant, which 
 aggregated $223,000. By the new method, adopted for 
 the first time last February by the Supervisors, the value 
 of the company's property was first scientifically de- 
 termined, and upon it an agreed percentage allowed. 
 Then, on that basis, it was found that the contribution 
 of the city and water rate payers should be approxi- 
 mately $140,000 less this year than last, and the question 
 before the Supervisors was whether to reduce the gen- 
 eral rates by that amount or to give the city in hydrant 
 rates the whole benefit of the reduction. They adopted 
 the latter plan, and fixed a lump sum, $80,000, instead 
 of a per hydrant rate for that service. This also, by 
 saving it from hydrant bills, gave the city, in addition 
 to the surplus, $140,000 within the dollar limit for 
 public improvements. The water company has not 
 collected any part of this hydrant rate during the fiscal 
 year beginning last July, but is disputing the validity of 
 the water order in the courts. It would appear that in 
 any event it cannot receive more than the $80,000 ap- 
 propriated this year in the budget, for this is the limit 
 of expenditure; but it is endeavoring to establish a 
 precedent for future years, and hence the importance of 
 
 74 
 
vigorously defending the action, which [is now in the 
 able hands of the City Attorney. 
 
 The Assessor, controlling in many respects the most 
 important department of the city government, has, by 
 the assessment of franchises and other forms of personal 
 property, raised the assessment roll until it now fully 
 yields, within the dollar limit, ample funds for the 
 maintenance of the city government, and, as we have seen, 
 about $350,000 for street and other extraordinary im- 
 provements, thus justifying the dollar limit, which is 
 one of the principal features of the charter. Our rev- 
 enue will thus increase steadily with the growth of the 
 city. For the most part, all other city officials have 
 during their terms creditably performed their duties. 
 
 The Board of Public Works has, during the last two 
 years, laid many miles of streets, and the character of 
 the work has been first-class. Much money has been 
 spent in the repair of public buildings, and estimates 
 have been made for water, gas and electric light, tele- 
 phone, street railway and other plants, in compliance 
 with the provisions of the charter, preliminary to the 
 submission of the propositions to the people. The 
 most pressing need is the introduction of an abundant 
 pure water supply from the Sierras, and the initial 
 work has been fairly begun. It is only now necessary for 
 the people to authorize a bond issue. Necessary public 
 improvements will also be submitted for the approval 
 of the people, the outgoing Board of Supervisors and 
 the present Board of Public Works having paved the 
 way for sewers, school buildings, hospital, parks and 
 playgrounds. 
 
 It is proposed to connect the Park with the Presidio 
 at Mountain Lake Park, one- half of which is owned by 
 
 75 
 
the city. The city should also acquire the strip of land, 
 a block wide, between the Park and the Cliff House, in 
 order to make a park effect and prevent the disfigure- 
 ment of the superb ocean front, which distinguishes San 
 Francisco among the cities of the world. 
 
 The only reason why the acquisition of the thirteen 
 blocks to bring the Park down to Market street, and 
 provide for it a fitting entrance, was not resubmitted to 
 the people (it once having prevailed) is that it 
 was deemed expedient by the friends of the measure to 
 let the utilities — water, street railways, hospitals, school- 
 houses and sewers — be voted on first. When that is 
 done, the people should at once be given an opportunity 
 to vote on the panhandle project. The land is now 
 cheap and but poorly improved, if at all, and delay 
 means additional cost. 
 
 The Board of Fire Commissioners, obedient to the 
 mandate of the charter, has put that department on a 
 fully paid basis and taken it absolutely out of politics. 
 
 The Board of Education has introduced cooking and 
 manual training in the schools, which serves not only a 
 useful purpose in inculcating a taste for mechanical 
 work and domestic economy, but also affords recreation. 
 The department has been greatly improved in efficiency 
 and the schools are now conducted in the interest of 
 the children. 
 
 The Police Commission has, from the beginning, 
 attracted considerable public attention. On account of 
 the character of its work, and its extensive discretionary 
 powers under the charter in granting and refusing 
 licenses to saloons, attempts have been made from time 
 to time, by those who live under the shadow of the law, 
 to impose upon and browbeat the board. In the second 
 
 76 
 
month of my term I was compelled to re-organize it, 
 when W. P. Sullivan, Jr., was elected Chief of Police. 
 This devoted officer, in spite of hostile and unjust criti- 
 cism, did his whole duty with honor and distinction, 
 and finally, the burden being too heavy, gave up his 
 life. 
 
 There has been no criticism reflecting on the integrity 
 or the courage of the Board of Police Commissioners. 
 During the recent wasteful and unfortunate strike, the 
 duty of the police was to uphold the law and to see that 
 every citizen might pursue his daily work without 
 molestation. To attain that end, they chose methods 
 which subjected them to censure on the part of many. 
 But calmer judgment has shown us that in a time of 
 incipient riot, when open and violent acts of lawlessness 
 were of daily occurrence, it was necessary for the 
 police, their numbers being inadequate to patrol the 
 streets, to give escort to non-union men and to keep the 
 highways clear for their safe passage, not because they 
 favored them in the industrial conflict, but because they 
 favored, as every good American citizen does, the up- 
 holding and the preservation of the constitution and 
 the laws. 
 
 It would have been a great satisfaction for this 
 administration to have settled the differences between 
 employer and employe, the Mayor and the Supervisors 
 having intervened for this purpose, but when negotia- 
 tions failed and a physical conflict was precipitated, it 
 was likewise a satisfaction to the administration and to 
 the thoughtful and patriotic people of this city that the 
 law was upheld without an appeal, as inany hastily 
 requested, for state and federal aid. The municipality 
 proved sufficient for itself. 
 
 77 
 
By the vigilance of the Board of Health, this city 
 was saved from Oriental infection, which visited, during 
 the last two years, Hong Kong, Honolulu, Sydney and 
 other Pacific ports. In common with other commissions, 
 they were criticised for doing their duty. The Federal 
 Government, which maintains here a National quaran- 
 tine, through disinterested experts of the highest 
 standing, has justified, in this respect, their official acts. 
 The city's disposition to co-operate with Washington 
 preserved friendly relations. 
 
 The Park Commission has maintained the same high 
 average efficiency, greatly improved the small squares 
 and introduced athletic sports in the Park. And, the 
 Election Commissioners have ably performed their 
 important functions. 
 
 The first administration under the New Charter went 
 into office with the purpose to serve the people and the 
 people only. This it has done. The evil influences of 
 the past — corrupt bossism and corporation control — 
 were unknown to San Francisco during the last two 
 years. Every measure was passed upon its merits, and 
 public work was done without scandal. Harmony 
 existed between the legislative and the executive 
 branches of the government, and I trust those pleasant 
 relations shall continue to remain between the newly 
 elected Board of Supervisors and the Mayor. 
 
 I desire to thank my colleagues for their unfailing 
 courtesy. Several of them have, however, departed this 
 life amidst circumstances of profound regret and sorrow. 
 Supervisors Helms and Duboce, Coroner Beverly C. Cole, 
 Chief of Police William P. Sullivan, Jr., Clerk of the 
 Board of Supervisors John A. Kussell, President of the 
 Board or Civil Service Commissioners J. Kichard Freud, 
 
 78 
 
Freeholders Dr. John A. Nightingale, Jr., Joseph 
 Britton, L R. Ellert, Henry N. Clement and John C. 
 Nobbmann have passed away. These men, who were all so 
 interested iu the success of the charter, departed without 
 witnessing the consummation of our work; but had they 
 been spared to be with us this day, in common with you 
 who remain, they would have shared the pleasure and 
 satisfaction of knowing that their efforts have resulted 
 in making San Francisco a free city, equipped with a 
 model organic law, which has been safely inaugurated; 
 and that, to our successors in office, we have been able 
 to transmit a government whose civic administration, 
 while conspicuously clean, has, we believe, at the same 
 time been a positive force for good, which we trust 
 shall endure. 
 
 / Cubery * Co., Printer!, 587 Mission St., 8. F. 
 
RETURN TO the circulation desk of any 
 
 University of California Library 
 
 or to the 
 
 NORTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY 
 Bldg. 400, Richmond Field Station 
 University of California 
 Richmond, CA 94804-4698 
 
 ALL BOOKS MAY BE RECALLED AFTER 7 DAYS 
 2-month loans may be renewed by calling 
 
 (415) 642-6753 
 1-year loans may be recharged by bringing books 
 
 to NRLF 
 Renewals and recharges may be made 4 days 
 
 prior to due date 
 
 •&*kf 
 
 u **d 
 
 
 DUE AS STAMPED BELOW 
 
 
 py 
 
 JUN 09 1992 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 J 
 
 MAY 8 2002 
 
 
 vy 
 
 Igj 
 
 r rff'/m 
 
 1 
 
 
 -•- .~ 
 
 
 
 S3 
 
 
 
 LD 21-100m-8,'34 
 
 *WK£ 
 
3ELs *f?%£ 
 
 BERKELEY LIBRARIES 
 
 B0Dllb3D 
 
 
 98825 
 
 ^*& 
 
 ■^Wf