Ruef on this point testified before the Grand Jury as follows:
“I received from Mr. Frank G. Drum, $20,000 as an attorney’s fee as spoken of between ourselves, about the time that the gas rates were being fixed. Of that money, I gave to Mr. Gallagher for the Board of Supervisors about, as I remember It now, $14,000. It may have been a few hundred dollars more or less. I think about $14,000. Mr. Drum spoke to me about employing me in the service of the company some month or two before, I believe, and engaged me as attorney to represent the interests, as I understood it from him, which he represented in the company, at $1000 a month, of which I received, I believe, for two or three months. At the time of the fixing of the gas rates some of the Supervisors, as I was informed by Supervisor Gallagher, insisted upon fixing an extremely low rate, such a rate as would have been ruinous to the business of the company, a rate which neither I nor any one who had looked up the question would have considered under any circumstances to be reasonable, proper or maintainable, and said they were determined absolutely to reduce those rates. The matter was brought up at one of the Sunday evening caucuses and some of the members of the Board of Supervisors insisted that the board had been pledged by its platform to a rate of 75c. per thousand feet; they thought that was even too much and made some strong speeches and others maintained the 75c. rate and they contemplated fixing the 75c. rate that evening, that is to say, agreeing to do it at the proper time which I suppose was a week thereafter. In the meantime, the company sustained a heavy fire loss, not the fire of April 18th, but the previous fire, which caused them a great deal of damage, and I told Mr. Drum that it would be necessary for me, in order to protect the interests of the company and the interests which he represented, to have an additional attorney’s fee and I told him that I thought it would require $20,000. He considered the matter and one day, a day or two afterward, he agreed to pay me the additional attorney’s fee of $20,000 which I thereafter received.
“Q. Where did the conversation take place in which you told him about the necessity of having the $20,000? A. At his office in the Mills Building.”
Although the Graft Prosecution was to be effectively opposed by Union Labor party leaders, the San Francisco Labor Council, made up of representatives of practically every San Francisco labor union, on the night of March 23, 1907, adopted resolutions declaring for the prosecution of bribe-givers as follows:
“Whereas, The indictments issued during the past few days by the San Francisco Grand Jury against certain individuals involve specific charges of flagrant and widespread corruption on the part of many members of the present city government; and whereas, said government, having adopted the name of ‘Union Labor’ has professed particular concern for the welfare of the working class, as represented by organized labor, and has sought and secured election upon pledges of loyalty to the principles, economic and political, to which organized labor everywhere is committed; and whereas, the alleged conduct of the city government is not only grossly repugnant to the principles of organized labor, but violates every rule of common honesty; and whereas, the conduct of the ‘Union Labor’ government and the inevitable association thereof with the character of the labor movement is calculated to lead to public misconception of the latter and thus to injure it and lessen its efficiency in its chosen field, therefore be it
“Resolved, By the San Francisco Labor Council, that we declare that every corruptionist, briber and bribed, should be prosecuted and punished according to law, and hereby pledge our co-operation to that end; further
“Resolved, That we reassert the position of the San Francisco Labor Council as a body organized and conducted for purely economic purposes, having no connection, direct or implied, with the Union Labor party or any other political party or organization, and therefore being in no way responsible for the conduct or misconduct of any such party or organization; further
“Resolved, That we also reaffirm our belief that the private ownership of public utilities constitutes the chief source of public corruption, and is in fact a premium thereon, and therefore ought to be displaced by the system of public ownership of public utilities.”