Douglas Fowler - Custodian of Voting Machines

Custodian of Voting Machines

Fowler was appointed by Long as the director of the state Board of Registration, a position earlier held by Long confidant Drayton Boucher of Springhill, a former member of the Louisiana State Senate from Webster and Bossier parishes. Fowler's title was changed to "custodian" in 1959, and he ran for the position in the 1959-1960 Democratic primaries. Fowler said that he deserved the appointment because "I worked hard enough for it, and no one deserved it more," and he "beat the bushes" for Long in the 1947-1948 gubernatorial cycle. That year Long defeated his old intraparty rival, former Governor Sam Houston Jones of Lake Charles. Fowler, meanwhile, defeated a number of opponents in a close Democratic primary race in 1959.

In the Democratic runoff election held on January 9, 1960, Fowler defeated David Wallace Chennault, Sr. (1923-1980), a native of El Paso, Texas, then living in Monroe. Chennault was the sixth of eight children of General Claire Chennault of the World War II Flying Tigers and first wife, Nell Thompson Chennault (1893-1977, originally from Winnsboro, whom Chennault divorced. Chennault ran on the losing intraparty ticket headed by DeLesseps Story Morrison, the mayor of New Orleans who ran unsuccessfully for the second of three times in a bid to become governor of Louisiana. Fowler ran on the rival ticket headed by former Governor Jimmie Davis, who staged a comeback for a second term in the office. David Chennault died at the age of fifty-six in Houston, Texas, but he still listed a Monroe address with the Social Security Administration at the time of his passing.

In the general election held on April 19, 1960, Fowler overwhelmed William C. Porter (1910-1977), a Republican railroad claims agent from Alexandria, 86.8 percent to 13.2 percent. Porter had been an alternate delegate to the 1956 Republican National Convention in San Francisco, California.

In 1963-1964, Fowler defeated Raymond Laborde, the mayor of Marksville, the seat of Avoyelles Parish, and later a state representative from 1972-1992, and commissioner of administration in the fourth and final term of Edwin Washington Edwards. An Edwards boyhood friend, Laborde ran on the intraparty ticket headed by Chep Morrison. Laborde argued unsuccessfully at the time for the abolition of Fowler's office. All of the Morrison candidates were defeated.

Fowler was thereafter easily reelected to the administrative position in 1968, 1972, and 1975.