Butler was a delegate to all
Democratic state conventions from 1872 to 1916. From 1894 to 1902, he was the attorney general for the fifth judicial circuit of Tennessee. Elected as a
Democrat to the
Fifty-ninth Congress, Butler was an unsuccessful candidate for renomination in 1906. He served from March 4, 1905, to March 3, 1907. He resumed the practice of his profession in Gainesboro, Tennessee in Jackson County. ==Death==