In these extracts there is presented very clearly the character of the illegal and summary proceedings to which the term lynch-law was generally and commonly applied in the fifties. The quoted passages likewise indicate the attitude of public sentiment at that time toward such proceedings and the frequency of their occurrence. The tendency for vigilance societies organized in the interests of law and order to pass quickly into the control of the lawless and the vicious, or for counter-organizations to be formed by the lawless element in the population, is also given due prominence. The Vigilance Committee movement in the West attained its highest state of organization and effectiveness under the San Francisco Committees of Vigilance of 1851 and of 1856. The discovery of gold in 1848 had brought to California in a few years men from all parts of the world. National characteristics came into conflict. Mexicans, Frenchmen, Irishmen, and Americans were suddenly thrown together in a virgin territory. The establishment of civil government and judicial tribunals could not keep pace with the rapid increase in population. When such civil government was begun, the control which the vicious and corrupt element in the population was able to exercise over it rendered it ineffectual. It was a time of social irresponsibility, and serious crimes were of common occurrence. Out of five hundred and thirty-five homicides which occurred in California during the year 1855, there were but seven legal executions.[192] It was under these conditions and on the ground that some such organization was necessary to bring about order and security, that the two San Francisco Vigilance Committees were organized. “Each hanged four men and banished about thirty. Each rescued two prisoners from the county jail by means of surprise parties.... The crimes committed by the victims of the first tribunal were against property and life, while those of the second were strongly tinctured with political immorality.... The reformation of 1851 was superficial and temporary; that of 1856 radical and permanent.”[193] On the whole, though the measures taken seem extreme, these committees accomplished their end remarkably well, and it is to their credit that they promptly disbanded when their time of usefulness had passed.