As governor, Murphy Foster led the campaign to disenfranchise Black citizens through the Louisiana Constitution of 1898, calling for an end to "the leprous virus of negro suffrage, thereby creating a running sore which has ever since tainted our government, both federal and state, with foul corruption and loathsome disease.

Foster rode a wave of popular dissatisfaction with the more unsavory aspects of the casino gambling that had been legalized under outgoing Governor Edwin W. Edwards.

His conservative platform included attacks on welfare abuse, gun control, affirmative action, racial quotas, and political corruption.

[4] Foster edged out two more well-known candidates for a seat in the runoff with then-United States Representative Cleo Fields from Louisiana's 4th congressional district, a prominent black Democratic politician.

Always a man of few words, Foster remarked briefly about the historicity of the occasion and made cordial statements about outgoing four-term Governor Edwin Edwards, who was present.

[citation needed] Foster defeated black Democratic candidates in both of his campaigns for governor—Cleo Fields in 1995 and Congressman William Jefferson of Louisiana's 2nd congressional district in 1999.

He ended state affirmative action and set-aside programs, which earned him the support of the business community but prompted protests from civil rights groups.

[citation needed] As his executive counsel, Foster appointed the Democrat Cheney Joseph Jr. (1942–2015), a member of the LSU Law School faculty and a former district attorney for East Baton Rouge Parish.

[6] Foster instituted mandatory standardized testing for grade advancement in a move described by his administration as an effort to make public schools more accountable.

In November 1996 the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers requested that Foster appoint a lead agency to coordinate state participation in the Atchafalaya Basin Project.

[citation needed] In his 1995 campaign, Foster paid more than $150,000 for former Ku Klux Klansman David Duke's mailing list of supporters.

After failing to report the purchase as a campaign expenditure, Foster became the first Louisiana governor to admit and pay a fine for a violation of the state's ethics code.