Louisiana 2011 Legislative Analysis – House District 10
Incumbent – Jean Doerge (D – Term limited in 2011)
District Map
House District 10
Voting History
|
2008 President |
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| Current District | New District | |
| John McCain (R) | 11417 (62%) | 12251 (63%) |
| Barack Obama (D) | 6610 (36%) | 6836 (35%) |
| Others | 243 (1%) | 253 (1%) |
|
2008 Senate |
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| Current District | New District | |
| Mary Landrieu (D) | 8516 (49%) | 8882 (48%) |
| John Kennedy (R) | 8468 (49%) | 9103 (49%) |
| Others | 435 (3%) | 463 (3%) |
|
2010 Senate |
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| Current District | New District | |
| David Vitter (R) | 7380 (60%) | 7869 (61%) |
| Charlie Melancon (D) | 4191 (34%) | 4319 (33%) |
| Others | 741 (6%) | 773 (6%) |
|
2010 Lt Governor |
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| Current District | New District | |
| Jay Dardenne (R) | 6780 (55%) | 7202 (55%) |
| Caroline Fayard (D) | 5583 (45%) | 5792 (45%) |
Current District
House District 10 for years has been contained entirely within Webster Parish. Politically, this is a swing district, as the 31% black voter registration (up from 30% when the lines were last drawn), combined with ancestral Democratic loyalties, provides Democrats with a solid voter base.
In political terms, this means that Republicans typically carry the district with about 60% of the vote in Presidential races, while Democrats typically win by narrow margins in statewide races. In 2010, however, Republicans posted solid margins here for the Senate, Lt Governor, and U.S. House races.
This is one of those legislative seats that served as an “Exhibit A” as to why the Democrats controlled the legislature until recently. From 1980 to 1990, Bruce Bolin was its representative, and he was re-elected easily. He resigned in 1990 upon election to a district judgeship, and was succeeded by Republican Eugene Eason, who was elected by 50 votes in a low turnout runoff. Those results were reversed in the 1991 elections: the runoff between Edwin Edwards and David Duke generated a substantial black voter turnout, and Rep. Eason lost his re-election bid by 71 votes to Democrat Everett Doerge. Rep. Doerge was comfortably re-elected in 1995 and served until his death in 1998. His wife succeeded him and was generally re-elected without incident, although it’s worth noting that her 2007 re-election margin was slightly reduced to 57%. She is term-limited this year.
Proposed District
District 10 was 5% under populated. Though technically no changes had to be made to the district (a 5% variance from the population ideal is permitted, and the district was 4.6% under populated), a small precinct in southern Bossier Parish was added to the district. This precinct slightly reduced the black voter population from 31 to 30%, and had the effect of very slightly improving the Republican performance across the board.
Can the Republicans pick up this open seat ? While Democrats have held this seat continuously (except for the brief tenure of Eugene Eason), recent changes to Louisiana’s political climate at least give Republicans a fighting chance. A lot depends on the strength of the Republican candidate and/or minority turnout, since Democrats have a much stronger bench of candidates who could run for the seat. Not to mention the fact that the demographics of the district give any Democratic candidate a respectable head start.