Forty-Five Years Ago This Week: In a memo to Colorado’s congressional delegation, Gov. Dick Lamm urged them to vote against the phased pricing deregulation provisions in the Natural Gas Policy Act, a measure introduced in Congress in 1978 and still under sharp debate in Congress.

“Immediate, total natural-gas decontrol should be opposed because of significant immediate financial impact on our people,” Lamm wrote.

Lamm brought up a study by the Colorado Energy Research Institute that demonstrated that decontrolled natural-gas prices would be 24% higher the following winter if the weather was as warm as it had been in 1981, 63% higher if the state had a normal winter, and 100% higher if the winter was unusually cold.

The impact of the potential increases, Lamm argued, would affect the poor and elderly the most because a higher proportion of their incomes were spent on energy costs. Lamm also warned that sudden price increases caused by decontrol would “cause a utility-rate revolt of the 1980s that may make the state’s property tax revolt of the 1970s look tame by comparison.”

In other news, Lamm also sat down with The Colorado Statesman to discuss President Ronald Reagan’s economic plan and his own plans for re-election. 

“That’s going to be a very tough question a year from now,” Lamm said. “I really don’t want to think about that. This is a love-hate relationship. Fire and Ice.”

Lamm said that his advisors had suggested he decide earlier rather than later, but that the question was much more complicated than anyone realized. 

“If you can imagine it from my side,” Lamm said. “It goes both ways. One says get out while you’re 47, while you’re ahead, so to speak, and try something different. I’ve never lost a campaign. I’m very challenged by trying to do something different.”

The Statesman queried top Colorado Democrats whether they’d consider running for governor. Several, including Attorney General J.D. MacFarlane, former gubernatorial candidate Tom Farley, and Colorado House Minority Leader Federico Peña, D-Denver, said they expected Romer to be on the ballot.

“At least that’s what I’m hearing indirectly from his staff,” Peña said. “It’s ridiculous, I have no intention of running for governor two years from now. Close friends of mine have encouraged me to run, but it’s ridiculous.”

Morgan Smith, Colorado’s agriculture commissioner, said he’d have to think very carefully to see if he had any “real possibilities.” 

“I’ve recommended that Lamm run again,” Smith said. “He’s very popular. I don’t see any Republican with stature who can give him a difficult race. Once when driving around in my truck I thought about being governor. But my blood isn’t boiling over for it.”

State Treasurer Roy Romer also anticipated that Lamm would run for a third term and encouraged him to do so.

“Ten years ago I had a political agenda,” Romer said. “But not now. I enjoy what I’m doing. I have an open mind and a sense of freedom, and I’m not a very good schemer.”

Romer said that he was enjoying his seven children and wanted to spend time with his numerous grandchildren.

“It’s too early for me to say even if I’ll run again for state treasurer,” Romer said. “I’ve always had options in the private sector. A couple more recession years and I may have to go home and get back to business. It’s not realistic, to live on $27,500 a year with seven children. But that’s not the issue.”

A year and a half later Gov. Dick Lamm defeated Republican nominee John Fuhr with 65.69% of the vote. Lamm became only the second Colorado governor to serve three terms, from 1975-1987, following Gov. Edwin C. Johnson who served from 1933-1941 and then from 1955-1957.

Rachael Wright is the author of several novels including The Twins of Strathnaver, with degrees in Political Science and History from Colorado Mesa University, and is a contributing columnist to Colorado Politics, the Colorado Springs Gazette and the Denver Gazette.