Frank Fulco - Losing To Art Sour

Losing To Art Sour

Fulco was defeated for a fifth term in 1972, in the newly-drawn single-member District 6 seat, by the strongly conservative Republican Arthur W. Sour, Jr., of Shreveport. Sour received 5,564 votes (53.2 percent) to Fulco's 4,886 (46.8 percent). Fulco and Sour were both Catholics and both Byrd High School graduates.

In the campaign, Fulco seemed to ignore Sour's candidacy because the Republican had lost House races in 1964 and 1968. Reports surfaced that Fulco was instead attempting to line up commitments to become the new House Speaker, but he instead lost his seat in an unusually strong Republican year in Caddo Parish. Sour (1924–2000) had benefited from the election popularity of GOP gubernatorial nominee David C. Treen, who carried Shreveport in his first race for governor. The speakership in turn went to Fulco's fellow Democrat E.L. "Bubba" Henry of Jonesboro, the seat of Jackson Parish in north Louisiana. The position had opened after the Democratic primary runoff in which incumbent John S. Garrett of Haynesville in Claiborne Parish was unseated by the businesswoman Louise B. Johnson of Bernice in Union Parish.