Edwin Edwards - Edwards' Record of Longevity

Edwards' Record of Longevity

Few governors have served four four-year terms. Edwards hence joins the late George C. Wallace of Alabama, Jim Hunt of North Carolina, Bill Janklow of South Dakota, Terry Branstad of Iowa and Jim Rhodes of Ohio as 16-year governors. Terry Branstad was elected to a fifth term as governor of Iowa in 2010. Former Vice President Nelson Rockefeller would also have been among the long-term incumbents had he not resigned at the end of 1973, with a year left in his term as governor of New York; Tommy Thompson of Wisconsin would have also served sixteen years had he not resigned halfway into his fourth term to become George W. Bush's first Secretary of Health and Human Services. James R. Thompson of Illinois was elected to four consecutive terms, but the first of them was a special two-year term because Illinois was moving its gubernatorial elections from the Presidential year to the midterm year.