Jerry Fowler - Fowler (D) V. Baker (R)

Fowler (D) V. Baker (R)

By the time he sought to succeed his father as elections commissioner, Fowler was a 39-year-old Natchitoches businessman. He was the early favorite to win the position, considering the tendency of Louisiana voters to either reelect incumbents, particularly Democrats, or to promote the offspring of retiring politicians. His main rival in the jungle primary turned out to have been a previously defeated candidate for the Louisiana State Senate and the 1973 Constitutional Convention, Republican John Henry Baker of Franklin Parish. Baker had lost in 1972 to the Democratic attorney, James H. "Jim" Brown of Ferriday, for the District 32 Senate seat. Months later, Baker was also defeated for a delegate slot on a nonpartisan ballot to the constitutional convention by then sitting Representative Lantz Womack of Winnsboro, the seat of Franklin Parish.

Baker was initially ignored by the media after he announced that he would oppose Jerry Fowler, but he soon gained the support of most newspaper editorial boards and "good government" groups when he disclosed that he was running for the position in order to see it abolished. Baker hence proposed that the "useless" office, which then had a salary of $37,400 per year, be returned to the jurisdiction of the secretary of state, where it had been before Governor Long punished Secretary of State Wade O. Martin, Jr., by having convinced the legislature to establish a separate elections bureau free from the control of the elected secretary of state. Ironically, what Baker was proposing would have worked to the advantage of his former rival, state Senator Jim Brown, who would be elected secretary of state in that same 1979 general election.

Baker polled 175,017 votes in the primary, just enough to enter the general election against Jerry Fowler. Baker and his gubernatorial ticket mate, David C. Treen, then of Jefferson Parish, were the first Louisiana Republicans to win statewide general election slots since the implementation of the jungle primary law in 1975.

In the second round of balloting, Fowler polled 762,324 votes (62.8%) to Baker's 452,189 (37.2%). Baker won 68.1% in his own Franklin Parish, which Treen lost to the Democrat Louis Lambert of Baton Rouge. Baker received 55.8% and 51.2% in his neighboring Richland and Ouachita parishes, respectively. He polled 49.1% in Caddo Parish (Shreveport) and ran nearly as well in Calcasieu Parish (Lake Charles), where he had the support of reform former state Senator Robert G. "Bob" Jones, a former Democrat-turned Republican and the son of former Governor Sam Houston Jones. Fowler though could claim an impressive victory under the circumstances, and he vowed to continue the spirit of public service epitomized by his ailing father, who died weeks before his son could take the oath of office as his successor.