Our congratulations to Colorado state Senate President-elect James Coleman, D-Denver, who was chosen unanimously for his new post last week by his fellow Democrats in the upper chamber. He will be confirmed when the Legislature reconvenes at the Capitol in January.

Coleman and other members chosen to leadership positions in the Senate as well as the state House of Representatives represent a mix of more- and less-left-leaning Democrats. Coleman offers a blend of those inclinations. Particularly on public education issues, he has been a voice for school choice and education reform, which have support on both sides of the aisle.

A Colorado Politics report on the Democratic caucus’ vote conveyed Coleman’s avowed commitment to his colleagues: “I will work hard to make sure you are heard and seen.”

But here’s the real challenge: Will Coleman and his fellow Democrats — who enjoy lopsided majorities over Republicans in both legislative chambers — make sure Colorado’s political majority is heard and seen?

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Just to be clear, the state’s political majority is not the same as the ruling Democratic majority at the State Capitol — the one that runs the Legislature and holds the governor’s office and other statewide offices.

As we’ve noted here before, Democrats in fact constitute nearly as small a political minority among registered voters statewide as do Colorado’s Republicans. Democrats claim only 26% of the registered electorate compared with the GOP’s 23.4%.

Where did the rest of the state’s voter’s go? By the latest count, fully 48.5% of them are registered as unaffiliated, and their ranks continue to surge. Most observers expect unaffiliateds to surpass the 50% mark in the next few years if not sooner.

All of which means that a small political minority has been calling the shots at the Capitol — and making the policies the majority must live by. The same would hold true of Republicans, by the way, if they were in charge.

For better or worse, that’s how the system works. State laws make it difficult for unaffiliated voters to seek elected office. So, it’s going to be either Democrats or Republicans who rule the roost — however unfair that might seem to what is by far the state’s biggest voting bloc.

So long as that’s the case, it behooves the ruling party all the more to rule more from the middle — to ensure, in Coleman’s words, that a broad swath of Colorado’s wide-ranging political views is heard and seen.

That’s something the Legislature as a whole has utterly failed to do for a number of years. The Democratic leadership has seemed much more concerned about appeasing and placating its ever-noisier, and growing, radical fringe than reaching across the aisle to Republicans.

As a result, Democrats have been passing more extreme laws driven by narrow dogma rather than the broad public interest. On business regulation; on energy; on criminal justice; on transportation — the list grows every year.

Their policies have been increasingly out of sync with the mainstream electorate. And for evidence of that, look no further than some of the ballot issues that prevailed — overwhelmingly, in some cases — in last week’s election.

Particularly on criminal justice issues, Coloradans sidestepped the Legislature using citizens initiatives and voted to crack down on crime and criminals. That stood in stark contrast to a Legislature that has gone soft on crime and coddles criminals in the face of a crime wave.

We commend Coleman for vowing to reach out. We urge him and his colleagues to extend their reach well beyond their party’s ranks at the Capitol — to tap into mainstream Colorado.

Denver Gazette Editorial Board