In the year 1868, a resolution was introduced into the California State Senate urging the appointment of a committee to investigate the use of moneys contributed by the state toward the construction of the Central Pacific Railroad. This resolution was indefinitely postponed by a vote of 18 to 17. The same year notices began to appear in the press, urging the legislature to oppose further railroad-aid legislation. In 1869, the _Sacramento Union_, while in favor of a grant to the Stockton and Tulare Railroad, urged the counties to go slow and to secure an amendment to the general railway law, reducing maximum transportation charges to 10 cents per passenger per mile, and 15 cents per ton per mile, before voting aid. These were but symptoms of a profound dissatisfaction with the results of railroad subsidies. In the fall of 1869 both political parties pronounced against grants of state aid to railroads, but this could not prevent the passage of the so-called “Five Per Cent Act” of 1870, authorizing counties to subscribe to railroad stock up to 5 per cent of their assessed valuation; although it did encourage Governor Haight to veto two bills in March, 1870, the one authorizing the voters of certain counties in the San Joaquin Valley to donate their bonds to the San Joaquin Railroad Company at the rate of $6,000 per mile,[68] and the other providing for the construction of a railroad by the Southern Pacific through Monterey and San Luis Obispo counties, and permitting the counties interested to grant aid. The governor took the position that the proposed subsidies were not only unwise, but that they were unconstitutional for the reason that a donation to a private corporation was not a use of funds for a proper purpose.[69] After a fight which attracted much popular attention, the vetoes of the governor were sustained. In 1871, Governor Haight was defeated for re-election by Newton Booth, the Republican candidate. In the following year, however, the Five Per Cent Act was repealed, and the period of local subsidies in California came to an end. CHAPTER III FEDERAL LAND GRANTS AND SUBSIDIES Government Aid Deemed Necessary