The 1879 Wisconsin gubernatorial election was held on November 4, 1879. Incumbent Republican Governor William E. Smith ran for re-election to a second term. The Democratic convention initially nominated Alexander Mitchell for Governor, but Mitchell declined the nomination; in his place, Milwaukee attorney James Graham Jenkins received the nomination. Smith and Jenkins also faced a Greenback candidate and a nominee from the nascent Prohibition Party in the general election. Smith ultimately won re-election in a landslide, winning 53% of the vote to Jenkins's 40%. Reuben May, the Greenback nominee, received only 7% of the vote, a significant erosion from the Party's 15% in 1877.
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