"Just give me some time," freshman Rep. Jim Hansen, R.-UT, told me during a meeting in his office in 1981, "and I'll make a Mormon missionary out of you." His top aide Ted Wilson (later a U.S. District judge) and his friend John Charles Houston, counsel to Public Service Research Council, both shook their heads and chuckled. They knew very well —as did the congressman — that mastering a new faith that excluded alcohol and cigarettes was about the farthest thing from my mind.
That was one of the few occasions that I recall Hansen pulling my leg or anyone's else. When he died on November 14 at age 86, many of his colleagues in the 55-Member House Republican class that came in with Ronald Reagan's election as president in 1980 simply recalled Hansen as a "nice guy" or "hard worker." But few had funny stories or memorable reminiscences about the Beehive State conservative. James Vear Hansen seemed to be in training for his congressional career for most of his adult life — a legislator's legislator.
A graduate of East High School in Salt Lake City (where classmates included Utah's future GOP Sens. Jake Garn and Robert Bennett), the young Hansen joined the U.S. Navy during the Korean War and served from 1951-54. He worked as an insurance agent while earning a degree at the University of Utah and he eventually settled in Farmington, Utah with wife Ann and their five children.
Elected to the Farmington City Council in 1960, he served until his election to the state House of Representatives twelve years later. Hansen eventually rose to be speaker and he once recalled "if you wanted, you could get a lobbyist to buy you lunch or dinner every night of the session. I didn't want either." In 1980, as Reagan and friend Garn were sweeping Utah, Hansen unseated ten-year Democratic Rep. K. Gunn McKay.
"Jim was unique in our class," former Rep.John Napier, R.-S.C., Hansen's fellow "Reagan Baby" in the Class of '80, told Newsmax, "He was a former speaker of a state House so he came with some special skills in legislating that none of the rest of us had. And he was a nice man."
Hansen eventually rose to the chairmanship of the House Natural Resources Committee and thus became the first Utah lawmaker to chair a House committee. He had sharp disagreements with environmentalists, but rarely did he become a high-profile enemy of the so-called "green machine." His calm demeanor and legislative savvy precluded that.
A hunter and back-packer, Hansen said he loved the environment and his goal was to "save the environment from the environmentalists." He crafted wilderness legislation (including the Utah Wilderness Act), wrote the bill that lifted the speed limit from 55 miles per hour, and managed President George W. Bush's 2002 energy bill to passage.
In '02, Hansen announced his retirement. Although he felt he was "at the top of my game," he also felt it was important for newer and younger conservatives to move up. He was succeeded by friend and fellow Republican Rob Bishop, who also became chairman of the Natural Resources Committee.
Jim Hansen made one more race in '04 when he sought the Republican nomination for governor at age 70. But he lost the nomination to Jon Huntsman, Jr., who is now ambassador to Russia.
Close friend and Sen. Orrin Hatch, R.-Utah, may have best summarized Jim Hansen when he hailed him as one who always "put principle before party and others before self."
John Gizzi is chief political columnist and White House correspondent for Newsmax. For more of his reports, Go Here Now.
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