The Louisiana gubernatorial election of 1991 resulted in the election of Edwin Edwards

Edwin Edwards

Edwin Washington Edwards served as the Governor of Louisiana for four terms , twice as many terms as any other Louisiana chief executive has served. Edwards was also Louisiana's first Roman Catholic governor in the 20th century...

 to his fourth non-consecutive term as governor of Louisiana. The election received national and international attention due to the unexpectedly strong showing of David Duke

David Duke

David Ernest Duke is a former Grand Wizard of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan an American activist and writer, and former Republican Louisiana State Representative. He was also a former candidate in the Republican presidential primaries in 1992, and in the Democratic presidential primaries in...

, a former leader of the Ku Klux Klan

Ku Klux Klan

Ku Klux Klan, often abbreviated KKK and informally known as the Klan, is the name of three distinct past and present far-right organizations in the United States, which have advocated extremist reactionary currents such as white supremacy, white nationalism, and anti-immigration, historically...

, who had ties to other white supremacist and neo-Nazi groups.

Background

In 1991 all elections in Louisiana—with the exception of U.S. presidential elections—followed a variation of the open primary system called the jungle primary

Jungle primary

A nonpartisan blanket primary is a primary election in which all candidates for elected office run in the same primary regardless of political party. Under this system, the top two candidates who receive the most votes advance to the next round, as in a runoff election...

 (the system has since been abandoned for all federal elections but remains in use for state and local elections). Candidates of any and all parties are listed on one ballot; voters need not limit themselves to the candidates of one party. Unless one candidate takes 50% or more of the vote in the first round, a run-off election is then held between the top two candidates, who may in fact be members of the same party.[2] In this election, the first round of voting was held on October 19, 1991, and the runoff was held on November 16.

Results

First voting round, October 19

Candidate	Party affiliation	Votes received	Percentage of votes cast
Edwin Edwards Edwin Edwards Edwin Washington Edwards served as the Governor of Louisiana for four terms , twice as many terms as any other Louisiana chief executive has served. Edwards was also Louisiana's first Roman Catholic governor in the 20th century...	Democrat	523,096	34%
David Duke David Duke David Ernest Duke is a former Grand Wizard of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan an American activist and writer, and former Republican Louisiana State Representative. He was also a former candidate in the Republican presidential primaries in 1992, and in the Democratic presidential primaries in...	Republican	491,342	32%
Buddy Roemer Buddy Roemer Charles Elson "Buddy" Roemer III is an American politician who served as the 52nd Governor of Louisiana, from 1988 to 1992. He was elected as a Democrat but switched to the Republican Party on March 11, 1991...	Republican	410,690	27%
Clyde C. Holloway Clyde C. Holloway Clyde Cecil Holloway is an American small business owner from Forest Hill in the southern part of Rapides Parish who is one of five members of the Louisiana Public Service Commission. He also served as a conservative Republican member of the U.S...	Republican	82,683	5%
Sam S. Jones	Democrat	11,847	1%
Ed Karst Ed Karst Charles Edward "Ed" Karst was an attorney and politician remembered for his controversial tenure as the mayor of Alexandria, the seat of Rapides Parish and the largest city in central Louisiana...	None/Other	9,663	1%
Fred Dent	Democrat	7,385	0%
Anne Thompson	Republican	4,118	0%
Jim Crowley	Democrat	4,000	0%
Albert Henderson Powell	Democrat	2,053	0%
Ronnie Glynn Johnson	None/Other	1,372	0%
Mike Geselbracht	Democrat	1,210	0%
Ken "Cousin Ken" Lewis	Democrat	1,006	0%

Runoff, November 16

Candidate	Party affiliation	Votes received	Percentage of votes cast
Edwin Edwards Edwin Edwards Edwin Washington Edwards served as the Governor of Louisiana for four terms , twice as many terms as any other Louisiana chief executive has served. Edwards was also Louisiana's first Roman Catholic governor in the 20th century...	Democrat	1,057,031	61%
David Duke David Duke David Ernest Duke is a former Grand Wizard of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan an American activist and writer, and former Republican Louisiana State Representative. He was also a former candidate in the Republican presidential primaries in 1992, and in the Democratic presidential primaries in...	Republican	671,009	39%

Sources

Louisiana Secretary of State Elections Division. Official Election Results Database