ABSTRACT
As a result of the civil war, Congress proposed and the states ratified three amendments to the Constitution, sometimes known as the Reconstruction or Civil War Amendments. New Orleans city officials had been trying to remove slaughtering operations from inside city limits since 1804, but their efforts had had little effect. As the city grew, so did the number of butchers and stock dealers, as well as their political influence. The butchers had not protested against the earlier Jefferson City ordinance, primarily because it had never gone into effect. But they organized against the 1869 statute, and for several reasons. The challenge to the law came from the butchers and their well-financed and well-organized trade group, the Butchers' Benevolent Association of New Orleans. Butchers were still free to ply their trade, but they had to do so in a centralized location.
