Yesterday was Colorado Senate President and DLCC board member Peter Groff’s last day in the Colorado Senate. With the end of legislative session, Sen. Groff will be resigning his seat to accept a high-level appointment in President Obama’s Department of Education.

Before he left, he urged his fellow senators to pass a bill repealing the death penalty in Colorado. That impassioned plea -– on an emotional issue with no national consensus -– should remind all of us why we put so much effort into legislative elections; why Sen. Groff was so respected by Democrats and Republicans across the state; and why all of us at the DLCC were so proud to have him as a board member:

And here was the challenge: "We will say we did what's right because that's what we're supposed to do. This is our opportunity, yet again, to actually be the moral voice in this state, to actually rise above the politics of the moment, to rise to that one moment where we say, 'You know what, if this costs us the majority, so be it. If this costs us our seats, our titles, our gavels, so be it, because this is the right thing to do.' "

He conceded that it was easy for someone like him, from a safe seat, to make this vote. But he said this was not about saving your, uh, seat, but about "one of those moments when a leader has to rise above politics, when morality has to rise above what is safe and convenient."

It was a fitting sendoff for an inspirational legislator. The bill in question failed by a single vote –- a much closer margin than expected –- after passing the State House, also by a single vote.

Sen. Groff was clearly the right choice for a presidential appointment, and we wish him and his family well in their move to Washington.