Cockfighting | 131 Cockfighting is a blood sport, now illegal in the United States and most of Europe People bet on the outcome of fights and the birds greatly suffer and often die as a result of the staged fights (AP Photo/John Gress) and a misdemeanor in 28 That year, citizens in Arizona and Missouri gathered enough signatures to place cockfighting bans on their ballots, both of which passed overwhelmingly In 2000, animal protection advocates in Oklahoma gathered nearly 100,000 signatures to place a proposal to ban cockfighting on the ballot Cockfighters went to court to prevent a vote on the issue, but their efforts only delayed a vote until 2002 On Election Day 2002, Oklahoma voters approved the ban, despite the expenditure of over half a million dollars by cockfighters opposing the ban Neither Louisiana nor New Mexico allow for citizen-inspired ballot initiatives, so animal advocates in those states focused their battle to ban cockfighting on their state legislatures With neither state wanting to harbor the distinction as the last refuge of the bloodsport in the United States, newspapers throughout both states ran editorials calling for the legislature to ban cockfighting On March 12, 2007, New Mexico’s Governor Bill Richardson signed into law a ban on cockfighting When the Louisiana legislative session convened two months later, a cockfighting ban was high on the legislative agenda The Louisiana Gamefowl Breeders Association, which had for years held off a cockfighting ban by hiring a top lobbying firm in Baton Rouge, saw the writing on the wall and agreed to a ban, with a phase-out over three years Animal advocates countered and successfully whittled the phase-out