creed-haymond

Gold Rush Teenager to Influential Politician and Attorney

As a teenager in 1852, Creed Haymond left his family in Virginia and ventured to California with a group of other young men seeking their fortunes. His first jobs in California included being a miner and mail rider for Wells Fargo. Later, he studied law and built a prominent legal, political, and military career. For instance, he was a criminal defense attorney who represented the defendant in a sensational, headlining court case for a murder committed in Ventura. He was the Solicitor General for the Central Pacific Railroad and won many lucrative legal battles for the railroad. He argued before the US Supreme Court and the California Supreme Court. Haymond was also a two-term California State Senator and a Colonel in the National Guard of California. Historical documents often refer to him using his title of “Colonel.”

Haymond was a celebrity of his era. Newspapers printed his opinions on topical matters, including his opinion in 1877 on the California constitutional convention. The society pages printed the social activities of him and his wife, even reporting on his return from a tour of Europe in 1892 to recover from his failing health.

He was someone whom today we would regard as a racist. When Haymond was a California State Senator, he used his power as the Chair of the Senate’s Special Committee on Chinese Immigration to promote cruel and racist state policies that have left an indelible stain on California history.

Haymond’s most positive impact was his work creating California’s first legal codes when he served as the Chair of the [California] Code Commissioners from 1870 to 1872. The Commission’s task was to organize the existing state laws into a new system of legal codes organized by subject matter. The goal was to allow people to read all of the laws on a particular subject within one legal code. Previously, state laws were only cataloged in the order that the Governor had signed them into law, making the laws difficult to understand and utilize.

Haymond’s commission organized all of California laws into four subject matter codes: the Penal Code, the Code of Civil Procedure, the Political Code, and the Civil Code. These new legal codes became effective at noon on January 1, 1873, and not only set the foundation for the future development of California law but were influential to other governments throughout the United States and the world. Haymond described this new approach of organizing the laws by subject matter codes as, “the growth of the world's civilization.”

Contemporary accounts of the commission’s work openly gave the writing credit to Haymond, who was rumored to have memorized nearly all the state laws in order to accomplish the massive task. For his work and innovation, he has been called the Father of the California Codes.

California continues to organize most of its laws within subject matter codes. Today, there are 29 subject matter codes, including, for example, the Education Code and Vehicle Code.

After Haymond died in 1893, many judges and attorneys eulogized him during an honorary court hearing. Haymond’s work creating the California Codes was eulogized by Grove L. Johnson, an attorney, politician, and father of Governor Hiram Johnson, who stated, in part:

"Out of the vast number of decisions, out of the innumerable statutes of the State, out of the various labyrinths, apparently inaccessible, into which much of the law and practice of the law had been carried by Judges, by lawyers, by writers and by the people, he evolved a clear, compact, careful system of laws that all men can understand, whether they are laymen or lawyers. To him, more than any other member of the commission, is due the lucidity of codes; is due the fact that we have codes which remain the proudest monument of the jurisprudence of California."

Haymond was buried in a mausoleum located at Plat A80, Lot 261 of the Sacramento Historic City Cemetery. Pass through the entrance gates to the cemetery, look towards the right. It’s one of the first mausoleums along the fence line.

By Rachelle Weed, July 2022, Sacramento, CA
Sources include, among others: History of the Bench and Bar of California, Oscar T. Shuck (editor)(1901); Chinese Immigration; Its Social, Moral, and Political Effect. Report to the California State Senate of its Special Committee on Chinese Immigration, Senator Creed Haymond, (chair) (1878); and various digitized newspaper articles from the Sacramento Daily Record-Union and the Morning Call (San Francisco). For more information on sources, contact the Old City Cemetery Committee, Inc.
Photo credit: Center for Sacramento History