Career
He served from 1964 to 1972. In his first legislative term, Patten succeeded William South. Peck, Junior., of Sicily Island and represented only Catahoula Parish. He was reelected to a second term in 1968 from a revised district which combined Catahoula and neighboring Concordia parishes.
The incumbent from Concordia Parish, Fred L. Schiele, did not seek a second term but later served as the sheriff of his parish.
Patten"s interest focused on rural development. In 1972, in the newly numbered District 21, Patten was unseated by State Senator J.C. "Sonny" Gilbert of Sicily Island, a brother-in-law of William Peck, who ran that year for the House, rather than the Senate.
Patten attempted a comeback in the Catahoula-Concordia district in 1975 in the first-ever nonpartisan blanket primary held in Louisiana and had the support of the Catahoula Parish sheriff. Gilbert did not seek reelection to the House.
Patten lost in the official general election, 57-43 percent, to Democrat Dan Richey, then of Ferriday in Concordia Parish.
Another candidate was the Democrat Troyce Guice, then of Ferriday, who had run unsuccessfully for the United States Senate in 1966 and again in 1996. Patten ran unsuccessfully for Louisiana"s 5th congressional district seat in the United States House of Representatives. In the Democratic primaries of both 1970 and 1972, he was soundly defeated by the incumbent, Otto Passman of Monroe, known as a critic of foreign aid programs.
Patten ran again for the Louisiana State Senate in the 1979 primary but failed to secure a general election berth.
Eliminated in the primary was state Representative Neal Lane "Lanny" Johnson of Saint Joseph in Tensas Parish. On October 19, 1991, Patten ran again for the state Senate from District 32.
He received 8,684 votes (204 percent) and lost to fellow Democrat Steve Doctorate. Thompson, a real estate agent from Winnsboro, who polled 26,840 (63 percent). A third candidate polled the remaining 16.6 percent.