“Among the early settlers there was a way of trying causes, which may perhaps be new to you. No commentator has taken any notice of _Linch’s Law_, which was once the _lex loci_ of the frontiers. Its operation was as follows: When a horse thief, a counterfeiter, or any other desperate vagabond, infested a neighborhood, evading justice by cunning, or by a strong arm, or by the number of his confederates, the citizens formed themselves into a ‘_regulating company_,’ a kind of holy brotherhood, whose duty was to purge the community of its unruly members. Mounted, armed, and commanded by a leader, they proceeded to arrest such notorious offenders as were deemed fit subjects of exemplary justice; their operations were generally carried on in the night. Squire Birch, who was personated by one of the party, established his tribunal under a tree in the woods, and the culprit was brought before him, tried, and generally convicted; he was then tied to a tree, lashed without mercy, and ordered to leave the country within a given time, under pain of a second visitation. It seldom happened, that more than one or two were thus punished; their confederates took the hint and fled, or were admonished to quit the neighborhood. Neither the justice nor the policy of this practice can be defended; but it was often resorted to from necessity, and its operation was salutary, in ridding the country of miscreants whom the law was not strong enough to punish. It was liable to abuse, and was sometimes abused; but in general, it was conducted with moderation, and only exerted upon the basest and most lawless men. Sometimes the sufferers resorted to courts of justice for remuneration, and there have been instances of heavy damages being recovered of the _regulators_. Whenever a county became strong enough to enforce the laws, these high-handed doings ceased to be tolerated.”[129] In the above extracts we have a fair description of the operation of lynch-law as it was carried westward by the emigrants from Virginia and the neighboring States. The weakness and inadequacy of the civil regulations, and the presence of such criminals as the horse-thief, the counterfeiter, the robber, and the desperado, who find the frontier both a retreat from the consequences of past crime and a new theater for the perpetration of crime, gave a constant justification for recourse to lynch-law.