East Bay

A Picaresque History of the Port of Oakland

The Machinations Continue

Our serialization of the priceless 1930’s Works Project Administration history of the Port Oakland continues.

In returning the ordinance to the council without his approval, Carpentier let it be known that his veto was not of the perfunctory sort. Hostility does not exactly cover his attitude. His motions passed through all the delicate shadings from chagrin and deep personal affront to benign indignation and pity for a citizenry who would so far forget its duty to its neighbor as to propose such a piece of legislation. "Preposterous" was one of the milder terms he applied to it.

In times of stress the cleric turns naturally to his rosary and in similar circumstances, Carpentier, the lawyer, turned to his law books. He found that the ordinance would involve the city in costly litigation. It would make the city liable for damages. But worst of all, it disregarded the rights of private citizens. The rights referred to, incidentally, were his own claims to the waterfront.

The note which accompanied the ordinance on its return contained many pages of carefully penned foolscap and has since become a classic in Oakland’s legal literature. It is printed here (in part)without apology, not only because of the importance of its text, but because it reveals traits of character in the man better than any collection of words objectively written could portray them.

Perhaps Carpentier laughed to himself as he wrote his lines but to the populace he presented only a stern and outraged dignity.

His reply read:

"To the Common Council—a Bill for an ordinance entitled ‘An Ordinance to provide for the construction and maintenance of a wharf in the City of Oakland,’ has been presented to me and is herewith returned without my approval.

"My objections to the ordinance go both to its form and its substance; to its form because it is careless and illegal in its terms and contains no provisions of safeguard to the city; to its substance, because, first it is calculated to involve the city in long and costly litigation, and exposes her to ruinous losses by way of awarded damages, and secondly, because it is in open violation of private rights and in contempt of that good faith which should mark the transactions of corporations as well as individuals.

"So bald is the whole thing of any guarantees of remuneration to the city, or of performance on the part of the grantee as to induce the belief that the ordinance was artfully drawn and imposed Upon the city council under specious pretexts by some designing person whose only object is to involve the city in an expensive litigation with some of her own citizens under the hope of gaining large advantage from the losses of others….

"There are unfortunately persons in every community not particularly distinguished for enterprise or attention to their own business, who are always eager to agitate and embroil under the hope that out of confusion there will come spoils".

The council failed to be intimidated by the mayor’s pronouncement. The matter was delegated to a special committee, which took the matter up with an attorney in San Francisco. The opinion of the attorneys (one of many lost documents) was presumably in favor of the city, for at the council meeting, September 13, it was moved and carried that the ordinance providing for the construction and maintenance of a wharf be taken up. This was done. notwithstanding the veto of the mayor, who on the 23rd communicated the following, together with an enclosure, no trace of which is to be found.

"To the Common Council—Herewith is transmitted to you a copy of a communication from the owners of the waterfront concerning the wharf lately constructed at the foot of Washington Street, formerly E Street, in this city.

"I have carefully examined said wharf and I find it to have been well and substantially built from the shore to deep water, a distance of five hundred feet, according to the terms and within the time specified in the contracts providing for its construction, and I have accepted it on behalf of the city and in full and final satisfaction and discharge of the terms and conditions of the ordinances, grants and contracts for the sale, disposal and conveyance of the waterfront of the town of Oakland."

In effect, Carpentier looked upon the wharf that he, himself, had built, and found it good. At this juncture the tables were completely turned, and the Carpentier faction was elated, for pressure was brought to bear upon the council so that on December 9, 1854, they repealed the ordinance to provide for the construction and maintenance of a wharf which had been passed finally on the previous 15th of September. Two days after the council meeting Carpentier signed the repeal ordinance with a flourish and without resorting to oratory.

At a special meeting of the city council, held January 24, 1855, the mayor gave official information that an outrage had been perpetrated on the previous evening, which took the shape of an attempt to destroy or abstract the whole or a portion of the records of the city.

Mayhap it was in the confusion consequent upon this violent proceeding that the several important documents mentioned were lost, and it is a remarkable coincidence that nearly all of the missing papers refer to this question of the waterfront. A reward of a thousand dollars was offered for the apprehension and conviction of the perpetrators, but whether they were ever arrested is a matter clothed in the profoundest mystery.

At the election of March 5, 1855, Charles Campbell succeeded Carpentier as Mayor, and a new council was chosen There now entered into the policy of the city council an evident desire to put their house in order and at once strike at the root of the evil, for on June 6, 1855, Alderman Giggons presented to the council "An ordinance repealing an ordinance entitled ‘An Ordinance Concerning Wharves," passed October 29, 1853, which abrogated all concessions made in regard to the waterfront.

The next move of the council, which seemed bent upon giving a deathblow to monopolies, was directed against an ordinance passed in April, 1853, granting to Edward R. Carpentier, brother of the former ex-mayor, exclusive right of ferry privileges between Oakland and San Francisco.

Thus was war declared on Carpentier’s waterfront claim. To support their action in repealing the ordinance regarding wharves, the following August the committee on streets and buildings was authorized to advertise for proposals to build a wharf at the foot of Bay Street. The jetty was not to be less than eight hundred and fifty yards long with a T at the end, one hundred feet in length and fifty feet broad.

This proposal had the effect of launching the city on a program of active opposition to the claims of the Carpentier interests.

The contract to build the Bay Street Wharf was awarded to Rodman Gibbons, who commenced construction with but little interference from the waterfront owners.

The waterfront problem now laid dormant for some time. On March 4, 1857, Andrew Williams was elected mayor, and in his message to the council, the waterfront problem was again discussed. He said in part:

"The question of the city’s title to its ten miles of waterfront property is of paramount importance. Certain individuals are claiming this property. We believe these claims to be without foundation. But there is a question as to its ownership by the proprietors of the Mexican grant of the opposite shore. To remove all these claims I recommend an immediate unit to quiet title to our entire waterfront property."