That could prove to be a more important challenge than usual for the co-chair of the GOP's convention platform committee. The party's most devoted conservatives and their more moderate presumptive nominee, John McCain, are at odds on some key issues, including immigration, global warming, stem cell research and a constitutional ban on gay marriage.

It's up to Burr, a senator from Winston-Salem, to unify everyone behind one set of values going into the Republican National Convention in Minneapolis in early September.

It will be a potentially delicate balancing act for Burr, who'd rather the spotlight be on McCain and on his more pronounced differences with Democratic candidate Barack Obama.

"Our goal is to write something that's truly reflective of our positions as a party, and to manage this in a way that even those who feel it doesn't encompass 100 percent of what they want at least know that the process was fair and open and transparent," Burr said.

A fellow North Carolinian on the committee, Mary Summa of Charlotte, said the platform would reflect the party at large rather than a "rubber stamp" of McCain's presidential platform. Summa, a former aide to the late Sen. Jesse Helms, believes immigration, gay marriage and embryonic stem cell research are contentious issues among Republicans this year.

"If the platform supports embryonic stem cell research, I'll do everything I can to get it out," Summa said of the controversial medical initiative that McCain and Burr have supported. (McCain said last month that he's open to re-examining his position.)

Burr said the platform would be drastically changed from previous conventions only if a compelling case could be made that the majority had redefined its position on an issue, and he doesn't think that's the case with studying embryonic stem cells.

"I don't want to prejudge the content of the product, but I would probably anticipate little to no change in the party's position," he said.

"This is not Senator McCain's platform, it will be the party platform," Burr said. "Will the party have differences from the campaign? Maybe."

Differences appear likely, despite the time McCain has spent appeasing his party. He wasn't a quick consensus candidate during the primaries because a number of his views varied from those of his party's base.

He voted against a constitutional ban on gay marriage because he wanted states to be able to decide the issue; he thinks man has contributed to global warming, a verdict some in his party don't embrace; and he sided more closely with business leaders who rely on an immigrant work force at the expense of alienating folks who support mass deportation of illegal immigrants.

"It's kind of like trying to put together a jigsaw puzzle when you know the pieces aren't going to fit," said Susan MacManus, a political science professor at the University of South Florida, Tampa. She thinks the GOP has great incentive to avoid any major platform brawls.

"Electability is kind of where it's at. Republicans feel like they have an uphill battle anyway, that it's not going to be helpful if there's a lot of friction and that becomes the centerpiece of the convention coverage."