For the Humanitarians reconstruction had produced written laws regarding equality of civil and political rights, which were deemed a subject of congratulation. Outside the laws they would have found less encouragement. The kindness of the white people toward the negroes had been changed to apprehension by the events of 1865. When the advent of negro suffrage brought the carpet-baggers to the South to marshal the negro voters for their own benefit, and when these men began to disturb the negroes by organizing them into mysterious Union Leagues and giving them indigestible ideas of their rights, apprehension became alarm. Negroes seized property of all kinds--including even plantations--by violence, supposing this to be one of their new rights. Already they had raised a new terror by crimes against white women, hitherto unknown. Some thoughtful men believed that the best defence against the dangers apprehended from the disturbed black population was kindness and friendly influence.[127] That opinion was not heard after the arrival of the carpet-baggers; its methods were then seen to be inadequate. Secret organizations were formed by white men for protection against the negroes. These organizations, which sowed the seed of a subsequent harvest of crime, at first included men of the best character and of the highest standing.[128] Thus reconstruction, together with its written laws, had produced conditions which made the net Humanitarian results doubtful, at least for the moment.