Hewitt Bouanchaud

Who was Hewitt Bouanchaud?

Hewitt Leonidas Bouanchaud was a Democratic politician in the U.S. state of Louisiana. A native of Pointe Coupee Parish, Bouanchaud was elected a member of the Louisiana House of Representatives in 1904. After an absence of one term, he was elected again in 1912 and 1916. In 1916, he was named Speaker of the Louisiana House. In 1920, he was elected lieutenant governor as the running mate to gubernatorial candidate John M. Parker, a Democrat formerly affiliated with the Progressive Party.

As the former House Speaker, Bouanchaud was chosen president of the Louisiana Constitutional Convention in 1921. The document produced by that convention remained in force until 1975.

In 1924, Lieutenant Governor Bouanchaud ran for governor against Henry L. Fuqua, and Huey P. Long, Jr. Bouanchaud and Fuqua received the most votes in the first Democratic primary held on January 15, 1924, with Long of Winnfield, having been eliminated from contention that year but gaining the governorship four years later in 1928. Fuqua defeated Bouanchaud in the second Democratic primary held on February 19, 1924.

Hewitt L. Bouanchaud was the brother of longtime Pointe Coupee Parish Sheriff Lamartine Bouanchaud. The Bouanchauds were sons of James Alcide Bouanchaud, a captain of the Pointe Coupee Battery for the Confederate States of America during the American Civil War. Alcide Bouanchaud later became a state district court judge. Hewitt Bouanchaud's nephew, Alcide "Bub" Bouanchaud, and his great-great nephew. Paul Raymond Smith, both served as sheriff in Pointe Coupee Parish.