considered clinically insane, prisoners exhibiting sexual or moral perversions, and anyone with more than three criminal convictions. The law was passed unanimously in the Assembly, and had one dissenting vote in the Senate. Some 19,000 people were sterilized between 1909 and 1950, when eugenics became generally disfavored by the medical profession due to its connections with Nazi Germany. As automobiles became more common along California's roads, Gillett agreed with the Legislature to pass the State Highway Bond Act of 1909. The act, which created a bond worth $18 million, effectively established the California state highway system. The system would collectively organize state roads, numbering them sequentially, and provide greater funds for maintenance and expansion. Gillett's governorship, however, remained continually marred with controversy due to his Republican nomination by party machine business interests. Writing in The Los Angeles Examiner, influential cartoonist George Herriman continually depicted Governor Gillett as a mule for Southern Pacific interests. Indeed, while in office, Gillett appealed to the railroads to not levy excessive charges on shipping companies and municipalities, yet still warmly welcomed their economic and political presence in the state. His warm relations with the Southern Pacific led in part to rising Progressive anger within state Republican ranks, culminating in the election of Hiram Johnson and a large number of like-minded Progressive state legislators in the 1910 elections. By 1910, Gillett was falling quickly into financial trouble, and decided not to seek re-election. Privately, however, it is believed that his wife, Isabella, did not want Gillett to continue the governorship. Post governorship Following his departure from the Governor's Office, Gillett opened a law practice in San Francisco. From 1916 to 1920, Gillett worked in Washington, D.C., as an attorney and lobbyist for the San Francisco-based Associated Oil Company and the Oil Industry Association. Gillett's lobbying in the U.S. Congress helped secure passage of the Oil Leasing Bill in 1920, which pertained to leases in the naval petroleum reserves. Gillett would go on to represent many oil industry companies and individuals in oil lease matters. Throughout the 1920s Gillett completed over twenty years' work in obtaining compensation for the owners and crews of sailing vessels seized by the U.S. federal government in the Bering Sea between 1886 and 1894. Gillett retired from the law practice in 1929, only to begin a new practice in 1934 in Oakland with his son, James Gillett, Jr. Gillett died April 20,