WASHINGTON -- Conrad Burns props up his cowboy boots and sits back among the half-packed moving boxes and stacks of books waiting to be sorted in the Senate office he has occupied for 18 years.

Just hours ago on this Wednesday, he gave a farewell speech on the Senate floor. Now he muses over the controversies and battles of his career, the good he's done for Montana, the people he's known, his last campaign, the need for a sense of humor in Washington.

If he had to do it over again, he says, there's not a lot he would change.

"I'm happy with what we did," he says simply. "I'm happy with myself."

Beginnings

A Yellowstone County commissioner for two years, Burns decided to run against two-term Democratic Sen. John Melcher in 1988. He pulled off the biggest Senate upset of that year.

The day after the election, Burns hired Jack Ramirez, minority leader of the state House, to be his chief of staff. Burns flew to Washington the next day and hired an office manager, Margo Rushing, who is still with him today.

"You got to put some good people around you and everything kind of falls into place," he says. "And trust 'em and let 'em fly. And that's what I did."

Entering Congress dead last in Senate seniority, Burns for the first few months had a "little bitty" temporary office until his current one was ready. He gave his first floor speech to mark Montana's centennial. Having no legislative experience, he learned from the ground up.

"It was kind of like trying to drink out of a fire hydrant," he says. "You're trying to get as much done as you possibly can. You do everything on a dead run."

Burns quickly became popular in Washington with his quick wit and down-home style. He picked his teeth with a pocketknife during one interview and promised not to chew tobacco under the Capitol Dome.

But some of the behavior brought criticism back home, where columnists and editorial writers worried he made Montanans look like rubes on the national stage.

Telecom

As a new senator, Burns was invited to sit on the Commerce Committee.

"I didn't know what Commerce did," Burns says. "I'm walking around in a daze, you know. But I'm glad I did that."

Burns eventually became chairman of the Communications Subcommittee. Many of his biggest accomplishments came in the telecom arena.

He wrote a section of the 1996 Telecommunications Act that provided incentives for broadband data networks. His e-signature bill became law in June 2000, giving legal status to online signatures on contracts. He was the Republican author of the 2003 Can-Spam law aimed at reducing junk e-mail.

With Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., he sponsored a 2004 E-911 law, providing funding to enhance emergency communications systems around the country. The Burns Technology Center at Montana State University-Bozeman is named after him.

Burns says he picked telecom because Montana needed new technologies to deliver health care and education in rural areas. And he had been a radio broadcaster. "So it just fit," he says.

Environment

Burns cites his work on environmental and land-use issues as his other main area of achievement. He takes pride in land conservation efforts he helped to lead, including the Blackfoot Challenge to preserve watershed areas along the Blackfoot River, and similar projects near Taylor Fork and Madison River.

Montana's natural resources bring jobs and wealth, he says, and government should limit its regulation of the extractive industries.

"Mining is a little bit different," he says. "You've got to have some rules and regulations for clean water and everything else in mining. There's no way you can make a mine pretty. But with your renewables, I could never ever grasp this idea where the environmentalists think you cut a tree and it's gone forever."

A Montana wilderness bill passed Congress in 1988 but was vetoed by President Ronald Reagan, at the request of Burns and his supporters on the eve of the election that year. Burns and Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., put together a subsequent wilderness bill that failed.

"We had Baucus come to an agreement on a wilderness bill, but then the people out there just killed it," Burns said. "So I never tried again. Besides that, I don't like the idea of wilderness anyway."

Burns said wilderness designation is a single-use concept and he favors multiple use.

"You can have recreation," he says. "You can have resource management and jobs. But under wilderness you can't. The only thing you get is backpackers. And of course us dumb hunters And you can't manage for fire, you can't manage for forest health."

Some of his biggest clashes over the years have come against environmentalists, he acknowledges. He dismisses them as partisans.

"The environmental groups are Democrats," he says. "So that doesn't surprise me and shouldn't have surprised me. They're just Democrats. I don't know why they don't put it on their letterhead. Truth in advertising."

Appropriations

Burns won a seat on the Appropriations Committee and rose to head its Interior Subcommittee. He used that position to bring home federal dollars for projects around the state, which became a cornerstone of his re-election campaign.

He also brought money to help Billings develop as a health care center, and research and development dollars to the state universities. He prides himself on helping develop light manufacturing in Gallatin County, bringing money for new biotechnology fields and improving aviation and communication infrastructure throughout the state.

"When we started to plow in a lot of glass, a lot of fiber optics, man I tell you what, you just seen that state come alive. It just bloomed. That was all our work. And that's not a bad legacy."

Native issues

In 1997 Burns considered writing legislation that would give Montana civil jurisdiction over non-Indians who own land within the state's seven reservations. The idea was seen as an attack on tribal sovereignty, treaties and federal court decisions.

"We never drafted any legislation," Burns says. "We just had listening sessions and everybody got all upset about it."

He said tribal courts thought they had jurisdiction over non-tribal private landowners.

"So we were trying to fix that, and we didn't know exactly how to fix that, and everybody got all excited about it. It just blew up."

He never tried again on the subject.

"To heck with that," he says. "The whole thing exploded. But nobody's done more work on the reservations out there for my Native Americans than I have. Schools, Indian Health Service I really worked on their community colleges."

Gaffes

Burns has generated his share of controversy with remarks he's made.

He referred to Arabs as "ragheads" when speaking to one Montana group. He once told an anecdote of how a voter asked him how he lived in Washington with its minorities, using a racial epithet for blacks. Burns responded that it's a "hell of a challenge." He apologized for both remarks.

But Burns says people made too much of some of his comments.

"Political correctness is the worst thing that's ever happened to this country," he says. "Controls debate. It controls how we talk to one another. We can't honestly talk with one another because we're afraid we'll say something wrong in a wrong way. And that's terrible."

He also stressed the need to keep a sense of humor.

"I guess I been called everything that can be called. And I didn't get sensitive over it. But some people find a way to be sensitive. 'Oh, how bad can that guy be,' you know? They call me racist. Don't even own a car. It all depends how it hit people. But they weren't meant to harm."

Philosophy

Burns' passion for the conservative viewpoint comes to life when he recalls his parents' courage during the Great Depression. They worked hard; they just plain hung on.

"I'm not real sure if the American people would go through that again," he says. "We don't know what tough is. That was a different mindset. And that carries over to you."

The experience is reflected in his philosophy of government, he adds. People don't need all this bureaucracy; they will make it if you let them, he believes. In fact, government should make policy allowing people the freedom to fail.

"If there is no freedom to fail, there's no freedom to be a success," he says. "The fear of failure is what makes us a success."

Campaign

Burns once supported term limits. In a 1997 statement, he favored a constitutional amendment that would limit senators to two terms.

"Over the last several decades, the length of congressional careers has steadily increased," he said then. "This leaves the American public with out-of-touch career politicians who are more self-serving than they are servants of the public."

But he ran for a third term in 2000, saying his seniority could help the state.

Burns calls the last 18 months the "most brutal" of his life. He clearly remains angry and bewildered over the media coverage he received during his last re-election campaign.

"You couldn't get a positive story," he says. "And yet I've probably helped as many constituencies, built as much infrastructure, and done as much good for my state as any senator in the last 50 years. What good did I get?"

Records show that Burns took more money than anyone in Congress from jailed lobbyist Jack Abramoff, his associates and client, about $150,000. Burns says he only got $10,000 from Abramoff himself, that he didn't go to the lobbyist's restaurant "a lot" and that the lobbyist was only in his Senate office once.

The media should not have mentioned Abramoff so often when "there was no proof that I'd broken any law and violated any ethics," Burns says.

Asked if the Justice Department was investigating him as part of the Abramoff case, Burns replied, "I'm sure, they were probably looking at it. They were looking at my financials. But they never asked, they have never contacted me We said, 'My gosh, come and look at anything we've got. Come on down.' But they never came. That's not to say they might not in the future, who knows."

Burns says he was "hung in the court of public opinion" rather than presumed innocent until proven guilty.

But he notes he lost re-election by less than 1 percentage point. "We ran on our principles, we ran on what we believe in and our values, and if you get beat for that, well then, so be it."

As for his replacement, Democrat Jon Tester, Burns says, "He'll have to use his own instincts. I'm satisfied he's got pretty good instincts. He's got to be his own man."

'Keep it active'

Burns is in the midst of clearing out his office now. His files and memorabilia will go to Montana State University.

He plans to keep his political action committee going in order to continue fundraising.

"We're going to keep it active and help the Republican Party and do some issue work for the state of Montana," particularly on rural issues, he says.

He talks about golfing, fishing, hunting and playing with his grandchild. But Burns, who turns 72 next month, also wants to keep his hand in political issues.

"The word retirement is a terrible word," he says. "It just scares you to death. What are you going to do?"

He plans to turn to the colleagues of both parties he's come to know in the Senate.

"We've made a lot of friends here, a lot of relationships, it's very good," he says. "A lot of international relationships. We'll probably follow up on some of that."

Burns stresses that all the work he's done and will continue to do was meant to improve things for the next generation.

"I'm over the hill, I'm history," Burns says. "I'm treading water until the Good Lord takes me away. But it's what you do for the next generation and the kind of principles and values you pass on."

Colleague: 'With Conrad, you're always back home'

By NOELLE STRAUB - Lee Washington Bureau - 12/09/06

WASHINGTON -- One day in the late '80s, Conrad Burns, a freshman Yellowstone County commissioner, approached then-state Rep. Denny Rehberg for advice on running for higher office, possibly the U.S. Senate.

Rehberg told Burns to set his sights lower and run for the state Legislature.

"If he'd listened to me, he's be the greatest legislator rather than being senator," laughs Rehberg, who became Burns' campaign manager in his 1988 race.

When Burns won, Rehberg became his state director, opening eight offices with him and traveling with him around Montana for his first two and a half years.

Shortly after the election, Wyoming Sen. Alan Simpson invited Burns to give a Lincoln Day speech. Burns and Rehberg drove down and were stranded overnight in his van by an unexpected snowstorm.

Around noon the next day, Burns, still in suit and tie and proud of his new status as a senator, tried to flag down the driver of a snowplow.

"He waved and drove right on by," Rehberg said. "We laughed about that for years."

Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., said he admires Burns' straightforward manner.

"He's a good man," Baucus said. "I like Conrad. He's folksy and always got something to say and it's always interesting. And with Conrad you knew where he stood. He's very direct, candid, there's never a question."

Baucus also praised Burns for his devotion to family and to public service.

"He served the state really well," Baucus said.

Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., considers himself a "very close friend" of Burns and his wife, Phyllis.

"We were extremely sorry to see him lose," Roberts said. "I think a lot of people misjudged Conrad and his great gift of humor and storytelling. Not all of it was PC, but it's cowboy humor."

Roberts also believes that some in Washington and Montana underestimated Burns' effectiveness and influence. He said the senator will now be able to get off the treadmill that is life in the U.S. Senate.

"I think he and Phyllis are actually a little relieved," Roberts said.

Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., said he's been fishing with Burns and attended prayer breakfasts with him every Wednesday.

"Conrad is a walking funny story because he's always got a quip and he's got a self-deprecating sense of humor," Coleman said. "Conrad is the salt of the earth."

Burns always had a sense of place about him, Coleman added.

"With Conrad, you're always back home," he said. "He brings that sense of home back with him to Washington, and I think that's a gift."