Los Angeles herald., 1910-09-18
compelled to do under similar clrcum-

compelled to do under similar circum-
stances
"As an illustration, after the indict-
ment of Schmitz and Ruef, and prior
to the exposure of the men higher up,
the Merchants association gave a
great banquet at the Fairmont hotel.
There were a thousand men present
Heney was there, and when his name
was mentioned the entire audience
stood on chairs, waved their napkins
and shouted themselves hoarse. Heney
was a great man and hero. We were
all popular then. Spreckels' name was
on every tongue. He was extolled,
extravagantly praised and declared to
be the most publie-spirited citizen San
Francisco had ever known. All this
was changed as soon as the men of
wealth were marked as criminals. At
the time of the merchants banquet
every publication in San Francisco
was with the prosecution, strongly in
dorsing it's every act. When wealth
was threatened with common Justice
papers, daily, weekly and monthly
fell away from the peoples fight and
Joined with Calhoun and his legal staff
in this great campaign of falsehood
and villif1cation.
LIE ABOUT sPRECKELS
"This was the beginning, and from
that day up to the present time several
groundless. baseless lies have been
persistently published in San Francisco,
Los Angeles and in eastern cities until
thousands OF well-meaning people have
either been confused and weakened in
their belief in the men who were MAX
ing the fight or have turned and ar
rayed themselves on the other side.
I think the most potent lie, the lie
that has done the greatest harm, that
has gained the greatest number of be-
levers, Is that oft-repeated statement
that Rudolph Spreckels organized the
graft prosecution because he wanted
to get even with Calhoun; that he
wanted revenge for having been
thwarted in his attempt to secure the
United Railroads.
"As this point would like to answer
that falsehood. The basis for it was
this: More than a year before the
graft prosecution was even thought or
Rudolph SpreckeIs was the moving
spirit of what was known as the
Sutter Street Improvement association.
This body of men was formed from
among the property owners along SUIT
ter street and Pacific avenue 1t was
known that the old Sutter street cable
was to be changed. 1t was worn -out
system and had to go. Believing that
the underground conduit was prac-
ticable on this route, they organized
to bring about, If possible, the in
stallation of that system. Spreckels
believed in it, in fact had had an en-
gineer report that 1t could be done,
and he insisted that it should be done.
Calhoun had many meetings with him,
undertaking to change his point OF
view and bring him to agree to an
overhead trolley. Spreckels, however,
persisted, and failing to convince Cal
houn determined that he would or
ganize street railway company, ask
for franchises on streets that had no
car lines install the underground con-
duit and make the demonstration to
the people that the better system
could be operated in San Francisco.
This company was organized prior to
the fire, but no franchise could be Sc
cured because Schmitz, being under the
influence of the United Railroads,
would lend no assistance to the
project. This is the foundation of the
charge made by every corrupt news
paper that Spreckels was actuated by
the spirit of revenge.
1905 ELECTIONS
ITO completely refute this charge I
want to tell you just what happened.
After the third election of Schmitz,
which was in November, 1905, and after
the Bulletin had been pesistently ex
posing graft In san francisco Tor three
years, felt that the people did not
believe me. I did not realize at that
time that AZ, 900 citizen of great city
would deliberately vote a crook into
the mayors office. I was sure that
they were unconvinced, and I felt that
the only way to convince them was to
prove my statements in court
At a mass meeting on Saturday even
ing prior to the November election,
1905, Francis j. Heney delivered a
speech at the Mechanics pavilion, In
the course of which he said, If the
people of San Francisco ever want me
to come back here and send Abe Ruef
to the penitentiary, I will come, I
did not know Heney at that time; in
fact, had never seen him until the
evening of the mass meeting. After
the awful defeat, remembering his
words. went to Washington without