REPRESENTATIVES IN CONGRESS.-Continued.

UNITED STATES SENATE.

• Terms begin March 4, 1903. † Appointed by Governor at death of Senator McMillan.

The State of California.

California is one of the most interesting, as well as one of the most peculiar, states of the Union. Situated on the Pacific coast of the country, between 32° 20 minutes and 42° of north latitude, it has a frontage of over 700 miles on the ocean and a range of climate wholly unlike that of states similarly located on the Atlantic seaboard. It has a breadth varying from 330 to 250 miles and an area of 188,981 square miles, giving it the second rank, it being exceeded in dimensions only by the State of Texas. It has two well defined and lofty ranges of mountains that traverse the state from northwest to southeast and generally parallel. These are the Sierra Nevada and the Coast Range, the former having several lofty peaks, of which the most notable is San Bernardino (11,600 feet), while the latter has Mount Shasta (14,442 feet). Some portions of the state are very rugged and broken by hills and mountain spurs, while others are uniform and level.

California may justly be said to possess several varieties of climate, that section of the state embraced within the Sacramento and San Joaquin Valleys presenting one variety and the western slope of the Coast Range anot....r, both of which are widely unlike that belonging to the section of the state south of the thirty-fifth degree of latitude. At San Francisco the mercury rarely rises above 80 degrees or falls below 40, while at San Diego the extreme ranges are between 101 and 35 degrees. The temperature of the entire state, north as well as south, is modified and tempered by the ocean winds, which are usually from the southwest, crossing a wide expanse of water warmed by the tropical currents of the Pacific.

The result of these conditions is that Southern California produces an abundance of various subtropical fruits, like oranges, lemons, grapes, prunes, almonds and other similar varieties, that are unexcelled for quality and quantity by the productions of hardly any other country on the globe. The products of the state, mineral as well as agricultural, are given in detail in the subjoined tables, compiled, in part, from the reports of the twelfth census. The history of California presents as many anomalies as may be found in its physical features. It has been under the jurisdiction of three separate and distinct governments-Spanish, Mexican and the United States. It came under the dominion of Spain upon the conquest of Mexico by Cortez in 1521, nearly a century before the English had made their settlement at Jamestown, in Virginia. The power of Spain was overthrown in Mexico in 1822 and California shared the independence of Mexico until 1847, when, at the close of the war between that country and the United States, California and some adjacent territory became, by purchase, a portion of the American Union. Between the years 1843 and 1846 there had been considerable immigration from the states into California, and a white population, estimated at from 12,000 to 15,000, was in possession of the territory.

The discovery of gold in California near the town of Coloma, in February, 1848, worked an astonishing transformation in the social and financial condition of the territory. The news of the discovery spread with great rapidity, and the year following witnessed an exodus of gold hunters from the eastern section of the country en route to the new El Dorado that was unparalleled in the history of this people. California soon found itself possessed of a population aggregating about 250,000 people, embracing the worst and most turbulent elements in this country, which was supplemented by equally depraved bands of outlaws from Australia and other foreign lands. A substantial government was demanded and a convention met at Monterey September 1, 1849, to frame a constitution. The organic law for the new state was completed and ratified by the people, and on September 9, 1850, California was admitted as a state in the Federal Union. The lawless element, both foreign and domestic, that had found a habitat in the new state was not restrained by the establishment of a state government, and in 1851 a vigilance committee was formed in San Francisco to take drastic measures for the restraint of crime and for the protection of life and property. There were no evidences of mob law in this or any of the committees subsequently formed, but they, by their constituted authorities, punished and checked lawlessness and crime so that by 1856 the reign of peace and state authority was thoroughly established. The financial and industrial progress that has been made by California since that time is well illustrated by the copious tables that follow this introductory statement. Perhaps the most notable event in the history of the state since its admission is the earthquake_beginning March 26, 1872, and continuing through several successive days. The line of the shock extended from Red Bluff, Tehama County, to Visalia, Tulare County, a distance of about 500 miles and covering an area nearly 100 miles wide, although the shock was felt in San Francisco and in other portions of the state. It was attended with great destruction of property and the death and injury of something like 130 persons. The completion of the railroad across the continent brought California into close relations with the older sections of the country, which has contributed directly to the substantial growth and development of the state by furnishing an outlet for its surplus products and also by increasing its trade with Asia and the islands of the Pacific.

The rapidity of the growth of California in population is shown by the several reports of the United States Census Bureau. The first census was taken in 1850, but the returns were, in part, destroyed by fire. A state census was taken in 1852, which is used as the basis for all calculations.