Mr. SPEAKER: The San Francisco delegation, to whom were referred Assembly Bills numbers three hundred and twenty-five, three hundred and ten and one hundred and fifty-four, have had the same under consideration, and the undersigned-being a majority of said delegation-respectfully beg leave to report them back accompanied by a substitute for the three bills, the passage of which they respectfully recommend, and in doing so offer the following reasons: We find, after careful and diligent examination, that Patrick Donohue, Patrick Creighton and James Brennan entered into a contract with the authorities of the City of San Francisco to grade certain streets in said city, and that the said Donohue, Creighton and Brennan well and faithfully performed their part of the contract; that the work was accepted by the city, and that the said parties were entitled to receive the wages of their labor, but have never received the same, and now, after more than four years of delay and costly litigation, are compelled to appeal to this body as a last resort to obtain the rights that have been denied them by the Courts. We find that after the work was completed and accepted by the city authorities that some of the owners of property who had been assessed to pay for said work discovered that the Mayor had not, either by neglect or because he supposed it unnecessary, signed the notice of intention, by which technical point they took advantage; and both they and the city refusing to pay, these parties have been kept out of their just dues up to the present time. We also find from examination of the books of the Street Commissioner that there are no other claims against the city in a similar condition to this, and that the payment of this money will open no door and establish no precedent whereby other claimants may expect to recover old claims, these being the only parties who have prosecuted their claims up to the Supreme Court. Now, in view of the above facts and knowing that they cannot be controverted, we submit: Is it not more just that a great and wealthy city should be compelled to pay this just and equitable demand-particularly when it only exists by the neglect or mistake of its chief officer-than that these poor men should lose their all? THOMAS N. WAND, FRANK MAHON. MINORITY REPORT. MR. SPEAKER: We, the undersigned. being a minority of the San Francisco delegation, to whom was referred Assembly Bills Nos. 154. 310 and 325, believing that the parties who ask relief under the proposed bill have no legal or equitable claims against the city, and that by the passage of the aforesaid bills the Legislature will establish a dangerous precedent, recommend the indefinite postponement of the whole matter. T. E. FARISH, D. W. CONNELY, Mr. SPEAKER: The Committee on Claims, to whom was referred the petition of Thomas Thompson, have had the same under consideration, and ask leave to make the following report: The petition represents, in substance, that in the year eighteen hundred and fifty-two he became the owner of School Laud Warrants Nos. 84, 85 and 133, for one hundred and sixty acres of land each, which were authorized by an Act of the Legislature, approved May third, eighteen hundred and fifty-two, to be located on any vacant and unappropriated lands of the United States in this State; that he located these warrants on unsurveyed lands in Santa Clara County; that prior to the survey of the lands of the United States, settlements were made upon parts of them and pre-emption claims under United States laws secured thereon; and that one portion of the lands was within the limits of a Mexican grant, and another portion now lies within the corporate limits of the City of Santa Clara, and is claimed equally by preemption by the authorities of said city and by the grant to the Western Pacific Railroad Company, either of which titles would prevail in law against that of petitioner under his location; that the United States Government having granted to the Western Pacific Railroad Company all her valuable lands in the vicinity of said locations, whereby the right and power of petitioner to float his warrants was greatly restricted or entirely prevented; and, finally, such was the situation of the lands located under the warrants that until the two or three past years the petitioner could not know that his warrants would prove worthless to hold the lands. The petitioner therefore prays for relief and that the State will receive back the warrants above mentioned, which he is ready and willing to surrender, and will reimburse him with the principal sum paid out, with legal interest thereon, together with the expenses of location, and such taxes as he has been obliged to pay on the land so located. The undersigned, members of the Committee, do not believe that the State can be justly held liable to this petitioner for the misfortunes which seems to have attended him in connection with these warrants; and they believe that there are plenty of vacant and unappropriated lands of the United States in this State on which the warrants in question can be located. And inasmuch as lands of the United States can now be obtained for less money than the cost of and interest, if allowed, |