[1][2][6] He was retained by the Spring Valley Water Company to attend to their business in San Mateo County, and succeeded in securing the legal rights and property without involvement in any lawsuits over a ten-year period.

[7][8][9] He then moved from Redwood City to San Francisco and was appointed general attorney of the Spring Valley Water Company, and continued to act as one of its legal advisers for nearly forty years.

[2][10] Fox declined several overtures to accept judicial and other positions, but ran for a seat as a Republican in the first session of the legislature held under the 1879 Constitution of California.

[11][12][13] He was made chairman of the judiciary committee and used his position to keep bad laws out of the statutes, reportedly causing the postponement of a thousand bills.

[2] In September 1880, he resigned from the Assembly to serve as an elector for presidential candidate James A. Garfield at the Republican national convention.

[30] In June 1864, after her death, he remarried to Mary Schwartz Rice, a native of France, who came to California in 1857 and lost her first husband soon after her arrival.