We're so used to hearing political talking points on issues of the day that it was refreshing last week to have a conversation with an advocacy group in which politics were absent.

The issue was roadless areas on federal land, and the conversation was with several local hunters brought to the IR's Editorial Board by the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership, an umbrella organization for advocates of hunting and fishing. We never got a clue whether these folks were Republicans or Democrats, but they sure favored big game.

Gov. Brian Schweitzer, like other western governors, has been asked by the Bush administration whether their state's want more roads built in areas currently without them. The hunters' groups are using the opportunity to argue on the side of roadless areas.

The main reason, they say, is that Montana is blessed with its wealth of elk and other game precisely because the state's roadless regions provide the isolated, wilderness-like habitat necessary for them to thrive. Indeed, they say, Montanans enjoy a five-week big game hunting season because of the roadless habitat. Only Montana and Idaho have seasons that long, and each state has large, wild habitats that stretch far from the nearest road.

In Montana, 36 elk hunting districts include National Forest backcountry that is accessible only by trail. Key elk habitats are found in roadless areas in the Elkhorn, Pioneer, Sapphire, Madison, Gallatin, Big Hole, Bitterroot, Belt and Continental Divide mountains.

There are plenty of other arguments in favor of roadless areas, including the basic fact that truly wild areas won't be part of our descendants' lives unless we act to preserve them. Although some would contend that areas for logging and other natural resources shouldn't be "locked away," the remaining roadless areas in Montana are without roads because over the years nobody could figure how the land could be exploited at a profit.

In any event, federal land already has more than enough roads. The National Forest in Montana has more than 32,531 miles of them, and there currently is a $558 million cumulative road maintenance backlog in the state. According to a National Forest report, Forest Service roads receive only 29.2 percent of the maintenance budget they need to keep them safe and usable. In the last fiscal year, the Helena National Forest and the Lewis and Clark National Forest were budgeted to maintain only 10 to 15 percent of their existing 4,500-mile federal road network.

Montana sportsmen love roadless areas for providing the deep backcountry necessary for elk and deer to grow to maturity. But you don't have to be a hunter to agree that Montana's roadless areas should be protected.