Pleasant was first city attorney in Shreveport, then state attorney general, and finally governor. In the 1916 general election, Pleasant, as the Democratic nominee, faced the
Progressive Party's
John M. Parker. Pleasant prevailed with 80,807 votes (62.5 percent) to Parker's 37.2 percent. Parker, a friend of
Theodore Roosevelt's until their political split in 1916, thereafter returned to the Democratic Party and won the 1920
gubernatorial election with Pleasant's support. At the time Louisiana governors could serve only one four-year term and could not seek a second term until four years had lapsed since the end of a previous term. As governor, Pleasant encouraged volunteers and contributions for the war effort. Louisiana's support for the war was considered to have been among the strongest in the nation. He named
Lee Emmett Thomas, a banker and a former
Speaker of the Louisiana House of Representatives, as the chairman of the Louisiana Tax Commission and then the state banking examiner. Thomas thereafter served as
mayor of Shreveport from 1922 to 1930. Oddly, Thomas was born in
Marion, Louisiana, and educated in Union Parish at Pleasant's birthplace of Shiloh. In 1917, Pleasant signed into law a measure by the freshman
state senator,
Norris C. Williamson of
East Carroll Parish, which authorized state funding for the eradication of the
cattle tick pest. When Pleasant was elected governor, voters also chose
Harry D. Wilson, a former state representative from
Tangipahoa Parish, who began a 32-year tenure (1916-1948) as the
Louisiana Commissioner of Agriculture and Forestry. Pleasant named the cotton farmer C. C. McCrory of
Ascension Parish as the
adjutant general of the
Louisiana National Guard. Later McCrory's son,
Sidney McCrory, served a term as the state agriculture commissioner. After leaving the governorship, Pleasant resumed his law practice in Shreveport. He soon broke with his successor, John M. Parker, over tax policy and supported
Huey Pierce Long Jr. Not long afterward, he broke with Long too and became a leading spokesman for the anti-Long
faction of the Louisiana Democratic Party. Pleasant was elected as a member of the Louisiana Constitutional Convention of 1921. That particular constitution produced by the delegates was superseded in 1974 by a newer governing document. Pleasant was a delegate to the Democratic National Convention of 1916, which renominated
Woodrow Wilson for president and
Thomas Marshall of
Indiana for vice president. He was also a delegate to the Democratic convention in 1924, which took 103 ballots to nominate
John W. Davis of
West Virginia as the party's
compromise presidential nominee. ==The later years==