Legal and Political Development 

 tended to the encouragement of a class of wander- 

 ing laborers, undesirable in the structure of the 

 State, to the employment of the Chinese and the 

 alienation of the white population from agricultural 

 labor, to the intensification of race hatred. The 

 period was not fertile in improvement of legal and 

 political institutions. One of the most notable 

 events during the period was the adoption of the 

 codes in 1872. The attempt to state the law, es- 

 pecially the complicated portion which deals with 

 respect to civil rights, in the form of a code has 

 not often been made in English-speaking countries. 

 The willingness to try experiments which has al- 

 ways characterized the Pacific States is illustrated 

 by the readiness with which the codes were adopted 

 in California, and, once adopted in rather crude 

 form, subsequently neglected. 



This readiness to resort to new ideas so char- 

 acteristic of the optimism of the people, an op- 

 timism perhaps in part the result of the even and 

 moderate climate, is well illustrated in the consti- 

 tution of 1879, the most striking political document 

 of the agricultural era. This instrument is frankly 

 expressive of the farmer's point of view, the farmer 

 who had been the victim of natural and economic 

 forces. The legislature, for example, is directed 

 "to encourage by all suitable means the promotion 

 of intellectual, scientific, moral and agricultural im- 

 provement." The temper of the constitutional conven- 

 tion found nothing absurd in the climax. The crude 

 theory that the legislative department should be man- 

 acled in order that it may be honest finds full expres- 

 sion. Thirty-three cases are enumerated in which the 

 passage of special laws is forbidden. To prevent 

 fraud, every act must contain the true title, and 

 must deal with only one subject under penalty of 

 being void. No gift of public moneys can be made, 

 no power shall exist to pledge the public money 

 in favor of any private or municipal enterprise. 

 We may smile at these remedies for the purpose 

 of making the people's representatives honest, but 

 the document is a tragical commentary on the 

 public corruption that preceded the date of the 

 convention. 



Hostility towards corporations is the keynote 

 of this constitution. It perpetuates the radical pro- 

 visions of the civil code of 1872, which forbade 

 the creation of corporations wuth strictly limited 

 liability, and made each stockholder liable for his 

 proportion of the debts of the corporation. An 

 aggregation of persons with strictly limited liability, 

 which the most eminent jurists tell us is an 



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