Enoch's stature within the community helped him get elected to the California State Assembly in the early 1870s, and later as the mayor of Oakland for a single term from 1876 to 1878.

He attended the nearby University of California, Berkeley, then studied medicine at the Cooper Medical College in San Francisco.

[2] During the San Francisco plague of 1900–1904, Pardee's quick rise in East Bay politics was noticed by the state Republican leadership prior to the 1902 general elections.

In the 1902 general elections, Pardee faced a four-way race between the Democrats' Lane, Socialist Gideon Brower and Prohibitionist Theodore Kanouse.

[7] The problem for California was that the state health board officers, previously headed by former governor, Henry Gage, strongly denied the presence of the plague.

In efforts to rectify this dilemma, Surgeon Arthur H. Glennan from the U.S Public Health Service was tasked with working with the new governor, Pardee.

The second plan suggested placing embargoes on California borders, where railroads entered, if health officials were not actively participating in plague eradication.

San Francisco businesses established the Mercantile Joint Committee to promote sanitary and preventive measures, in an effort to prove that plague did not exist.

The Mercantile Joint Committee were concerned that officially admitting plague would result in a quarantine, leading to decreased trade and commerce.

Finally, Glennan stated that if there was no official address regarding plague, the U.S Public Health Service would withdraw from San Francisco.

With this in place, Wyman reported that there were no new outbreaks of plague since December 1902 and Chinatown had met satisfactory sanitary conditions to business leaders.

During his medical studies in the German Empire, Pardee was greatly influenced by Germany's push for higher education and environmental conservation during its rapid industrialization.

Throughout his administration, Pardee strongly supported irrigation projects and waterworks throughout the Central Valley with the desire of increasing the state's agricultural output and providing safe drinking water from the Sierra Nevada.

Pardee's progressive ideas regarding conservation and distrust of corporate monopolies quickly placed him as an ally of President Theodore Roosevelt.

Both the governor and President Roosevelt enjoyed a good working relationship during their respective terms of office on the state and federal levels.

In it, the bill specified that a future state agricultural school would need a location already irrigated, with provisions for ideal soil and climatic conditions, as well as water and land rights.

In 1906, Pardee announced that he decided upon Davisville in Yolo County, located nearly fifteen miles southwest of the state capital of Sacramento.

Shortly after the beginning of his administration, Pardee, with the help of Gifford Pinchot, ordered a joint state and federal commission to inspect and survey California's forests.

[18] Pardee sought to take command of the situation himself, traveling to his native Oakland in the later afternoon to oversee the state response to the disaster.

[18] In addition, Pardee also visited other afflicted cities, such as San Jose and Santa Rosa, to tour and coordinate their own disaster responses.

Despite having been heavily praised by the public for his handling of the state bureaucracy during the 1906 disaster, Pardee continued to have a strained relationship with the Southern Pacific Railroad, one that had been ongoing since the 1890s while he was Mayor of Oakland.

Pardee's role in the burgeoning Progressive movement which distrusted large corporate monopolies, as well as his efforts to conserve and protect state forests, remained a constant thorn for Southern Pacific executives.

Writing in the San Francisco Chronicle on September 1, 1906, Pardee commented that "[I]t is evident that the Railroad machine and [Abe] Ruef did not want me to be governor again, and as they were in control of the convention, what kick have I coming?

"[20] Railroad Republicans, now dominating the Santa Cruz convention due to intense lobbying by Ruef, denied Pardee the nomination.

Pardee remained publicly active, returning to his native Oakland to become a co-founder of the state Bull Moose Party in 1912.

Unlike his predecessor Henry Gage and his successor James Gillett, Pardee's governorship has been generally well regarded amongst historians.

His efforts of conservation and education have proved to be long standing, such as the creations of bodies that would later become UC Davis and the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.

Despite their initial support of his nomination in 1902, Pardee's near-constant resistance to the Southern Pacific Railroad has spared his reputation of criticism for being too close to rail monopolies.

The Pardee Home, located in downtown Oakland, remains a tourist attraction in the center of the city, hosting tours and speaking events.