Rep. Richard Burr (R) Elected 1994, 5th term
Born:	Nov. 30, 1955, Charlottesville, VA
Home:	Winston-Salem
Education:	Wake Forest U., B.A. 1978
Religion:	Methodist
Marital Status:	married (Brooke)
Professional Career:	Natl. Sales Mgr., Carswell Distributing, 1978-94; NC Taxpayers United, Co-Chmn., 1993-present.
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From the Atlantic Ocean, the terrain of North Carolina rises slowly through the Piedmont--a transitional land of modest hills that lies between the coastal plain and the Blue Ridge mountains. The Blue Ridge, named for the mysterious blue haze that blankets it, provides the headwaters of the New River, which cuts majestic crevasses--alternately lush and mined-out--as it flows north to West Virginia. The lower Piedmont lands of North Carolina were first settled by independent-minded Scots-Irish farmers and by followers of British and German sects like the Moravians. This was hardscrabble farm country at the time of the Civil War, with few slaves. By the late 19th century, it was becoming industrialized, with textile mills alongside streams, furniture factories not far from hardwood forests and R. J. Reynolds's cigarette factories in Winston-Salem. The Piedmont economy was hailed as the basis of a progressive New South, although textile mills paid low wages and tobacco employed fewer workers.

Indeed, North Carolina's present-day affluence owes more to pharmaceuticals, banking and high-skill Piedmont factories, such as the country's most advanced tire recycling plant in Winston-Salem and a custom furniture-making operation in Kernersville. Lowe's, the $22 billion home improvement giant, is based in little Wilkesboro, population 3,000. The 2001 merger of banking giants Wachovia and First Union proved bittersweet for Winston-Salem, Wachovia's home base since 1879: First Union, the larger of the two entities, let the new company keep Wachovia's name but shifted most of the local employment presence south to First Union's headquarters in Charlotte. Yet for all the economic progress here, large swaths of the region remain rural, from chicken-raising Wilkes County to Appalachian State University in Boone, a key center for resurgent pride in the culture of Appalachia, a region toward which the rest of America has so often displayed condescension.

All these lie within the boundaries of the 5th Congressional District. The 5th begins in the heart of the Piedmont: The suburbs of Winston-Salem (though not the city, which is in the 12th). From there, it drops south just short of the outer fringes of metropolitan Charlotte; then heads west and north to the Tennessee line, taking in mountain communities like Boone. When legislators drew a new 13th District along the state's northern tier, they pushed today's 5th much further west than it had reached during the 1990s. Still, the core of its population base remains much the same: The Winston-Salem suburbs in Forsyth County, plus small industrial cities in Stokes and Surry Counties, including Mount Airy, the model for Mayberry in the Andy Griffith Show. The district, one of only four in North Carolina where registered Republicans outnumber Democrats, is solidly Republican.

The congressman from the 5th District is Richard Burr, a Republican elected in 1994. Burr grew up in Winston-Salem, was a star football player at Reynolds High and Wake Forest, then worked for a wholesaling firm. In 1992 Burr ran against Congressman Steve Neal, a Democrat first elected in 1974, who usually won by close margins; Burr was outspent 3-1 and lost 53%-46%. Neal retired in 1994 and Burr ran again. His Democratic opponent was state Senator Sandy Sands, a rural trial lawyer who attacked Burr for using Jerry Falwell's Liberty University studios to produce his 1992 ads. Burr supported the Contract with America, promised to make defense of tobacco his number one issue, and worked hard to tie Sands to the Clinton administration. Burr won a solid 57%, carrying all but two counties and taking the Winston-Salem area by nearly 2-1. He has not had a serious challenge since then.

In the House, Burr has a mostly conservative voting record, though far from the most conservative in the North Carolina delegation. On the Commerce Committee, his early cause became streamlining the FDA drug and medical device approval process, which he claimed has kept valuable and life-saving products from patients. By the mid-1990s the FDA was moving so slowly that it took more than 10 years and $350 million to move a prescription drug from idea to market, and 773 days to approve a medical device. At first, Burr took a radical approach that aroused much opposition, but then for over two years worked with the agency, doctors, patients, consumer groups and the pharmaceutical industry to come up with a consensus. With broad bipartisan support in 1997, his FDA Modernization Act became law; it requires the FDA to establish protocol guidelines before extensive research is begun, to review applications in a more timely manner, to use due process to determine scientific disputes and to create a scientific advisory panel. As a bonus, the FDA approved the Sensor Pad, a device to help breast self-examination, which had been a Burr crusade. He strongly opposed tobacco legislation and when Bill Clinton called for the Justice Department to sue the tobacco companies, Burr said, "This is an administration whose policy is to drive the industry out." With others from North Carolina, he later called for an optional buyout of tobacco quotas. He sought a crackdown on illegal textile imports, routed by China through other countries to evade quotas, and he opposed Clinton on PNTR for China. But he backed George W. Bush's call for trade promotion authority after securing what he said were promises that the local textile industry would have a seat at the table; that was not an easy vote, he said, but it gave textiles an opportunity to regain international competitiveness. To assist furniture manufacturers against rival imports, he called for tax code changes to accelerate depreciation of their equipment.

Burr advocated electricity deregulation and sponsored a bill to give states the ability to design deregulation if they want; it barred mandatory power purchases but continued current contracts and allowed rural cooperatives to compete wherever investor-owned utilities can. He unexpectedly became a celebrity when, while testifying in opposition to the law requiring that toilets made in the U.S use no more than 1.6 gallons of water per flush, he read from a roll of toilet paper. Critics have said that he and his staff have taken excessive corporate-sponsored overseas travel, but he defended the itineraries as "fact finding." Burr became a key player in crafting the Republicans' prescription drug plan. He proposed a cap--perhaps $2,500--on how much any senior pays during a year, plus the creation of a non-profit group to negotiate lower drug prices for seniors, as the Veterans Department does for vets. His plan would give seniors more control of their coverage.

Burr has worked his district aggressively, holding women's health and electricity summits in Winston-Salem, and employing a 30-cup rule: He buys a cup of coffee everywhere he stops to talk to constituents and says he has bought as many as 30 in a day. But his ambitions have turned statewide. After Raleigh Mayor Tom Fetzer, a longtime friend, dropped out of the gubernatorial race in 1999, Burr considered running but decided he didn't have "the fire in my belly." He has made no secret of his interest in running for the Senate. He was interested in running for Jesse Helms's seat in 2002, but deferred to Elizabeth Dole when it became apparent that the Bush White House was pushing her and that her standing with voters was very high. In early 2003, he moved toward running for John Edwards's Senate seat in 2004; White House political strategist Karl Rove gave encouragement and he had promised in 1994 not to serve more than five terms in the House. He said that he would decide by summer 2003 whether to run; if he did, he would begin with the advantage of a nearly $2 million campaign treasury. Whether or not Burr runs for the Senate, the 5th District appears to be solidly Republican.

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DC Office
1526 LHOB 20515, 202-225-2071; Fax: 202-225-2995; Web site: www.house.gov/burr

State Offices
Winston-Salem, 336-631-5125.

Committees

• Energy & Commerce (11th of 31 R): Energy & Air Quality; Health; Oversight & Investigations.
• Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (8th of 11 R): Human Intelligence, Analysis & Counterintelligence; Intelligence Policy & National Security; Terrorism & Homeland Security.

Group Ratings (More Info)
	ADA	ACLU	AFS	LCV	CON	ITIC	NTU	COC	ACU	NTLC	CHC
2002	0	13	0	13	25	88	57	100	96	86	92
2001	10	--	10	0	--	--	60	96	88	--	--

National Journal Ratings (More Info)
	2001 LIB	--	2001 CONS		2002 LIB	--	2002 CONS
Economic	28%	--	69%		21%	--	73%
Social	20%	--	69%		25%	--	71%
Foreign	14%	--	85%		0%	--	85%
For National Journal's complete 2002 Vote Ratings, as well as previous ratings dating back to 1995, please click here.

Key Votes Of The 107th Congress (More Info)
1. Approve Bush Tax Cuts Y 2. Limit Patients' Bill of Rights Y 3. Campaign Finance Reform N 4. Ban ANWR Development N 5. Faith-Based Charities Y 6. Bar Gays in the Boy Scouts Y		7. Ban Partial-Birth Abortion Y  8. Arm Commercial Pilots N  9. Trade Promotion Authority Y 10. Bar Funds for Intl. Court Y 11. Authorize Force in Iraq Y 12. Deny Home. Sec. Dept. Union Y

Election Results (More Info)
	Candidate	Total Votes	Percent	Expenditures
2002 general	Richard Burr (R)	137,879	70%	$420,600
	David Crawford (D)	58,558	30%	$12,311
2002 primary	Richard Burr (R)	unopposed
2000 general	Richard Burr (R)	172,489	93%	$421,060
	Steven Francis LeBoeuf (Lib)	13,366	7%
Prior winning percentages: 1998 (68%); 1996 (62%); 1994 (57%)

2000 presidential
	Bush (R)	163,705	66%
	Gore (D)	81,704	33%
	Other	2,147	1%
For 1992 and 1996 presidential results in the Fifth District, please see the Almanac 2000 online. Please note that these older returns reflect district lines as they existed prior to 2002 redistricting.

• Cook Partisan Voting Index: R +17
• District Size: 4,424 square miles
• Population in 2000: 619,178; 42.9% urban; 57.1% rural
• Median Household Income: $39,710; 9.5% are below the poverty line
• Occupation: 33.2% blue collar; 54.1% white collar; 12.7% gray collar; 12.3% military veterans
• Race/Ethnic Origin: 87.9% White, 6.7% Black, 0.8% Asian, 0.2% Amer. Indian, 0.0% Hawaiian, 0.7% Two+ races, 0.1% Other, 3.6% Hispanic origin
• Ancestry: 15.7% USA, 9.9% English, 9.5% German
• Click here for statewide demographic data.