1924 Texas gubernatorial election
November 4, 1924
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| Turnout | 60.0% 19.9 pp | ||||||||||||||||
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County results Ferguson: 50–60% 60–70% 70–80% 80–90% >90% Butte: 50–60% 60–70% 70–80% Unorganized county No Vote | |||||||||||||||||
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| Elections in Texas |
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| Government |
The 1924 Texas gubernatorial election was held on November 4, 1924, in order to elect the Governor of Texas. Democratic nominee and former First Lady of Texas Miriam A. Ferguson defeated Republican nominee George C. Butte. With her victory, she became the first female governor of Texas and the second to be governor of any U.S. state, after Nellie Tayloe Ross, although Ferguson was the first to be elected to the office.
The election, and more specifically the Democratic primary, was the climax of the conflict within the state's Democratic party over the Klan issue. Miriam A. Ferguson, wife of former impeached governor James E. Ferguson, defeated Klan-backed candidate Felix D. Robertson in the runoff after Lynch Davidson and Thomas Whitfield Davidson divided the anti-Klan/anti-Ferguson vote amongst themselves in the first primary. Miriam "Ma" Ferguson's campaign was run almost entirely by "Pa" Ferguson as a vehicle to return to the governorship after he was barred from public office in 1917. The choice between Ferguson and Robertson in the runoff presented an issue for anti-Klan drys and progressive Democrats, who opposed "Pa" Ferguson for his anti-prohibition stances, his conflict with the University of Texas, and corruption while in office. Most of the anti-Klan faction reluctantly supported "Ma" Ferguson who was viewed as the lesser of two evils.
In the general election Klan forces and disgruntled Democrats backed Republican nominee George C. Butte, although he disavowed the Klan's support. Butte posted unusually high returns for a Republican in Texas, which at the time was a solidly Democratic state. He received 41% of the vote, the highest for a Republican since 1869, and 294,970 raw votes, the highest for a Republican in the state ever up to that point.