Nominate: Best non-candidate convention speeches at national conventions

Posted at 12:52 PM on August 16, 2012 by Bob Collins (7 Comments)
Filed under: Politics

Listening to the political insiders on MPR's Daily Circuit this morning insist that the national political conventions are not boring and really are important, got me thinking about the best convention speeches in history that were not made by the nominee.

I'm soliciting your nominations for an eventually NewsCut vote, but here are some of my favorites in no particular order.

Zell Miller at the 2004 Republican National Convention in New York...

The GOP, by the way, is hoping lightning strikes twice when another Democrat-turned-Republican -- Artur Davis -- speaks at the Tampa convention.

Bill Clinton at the 1988 Democratic National Convention. He wouldn't shut up and the delegates started booing.

Mario Cuomo, 1984. Considered one of the best speeches ever given at a convention.

Your turn.

Ann Richards, 1988. This was the famous "poor George" speech, though the rhetorical flourishes throughout the speech were lost because of the one line. But the Bush family got the last laugh. She was defeated later in her career by George W. Bush.

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Comments (7)

HHH on civil rights in 1948? You won't find it on YouTube, I wager.

Posted by V | August 16, 2012 1:38 PM

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Actually, you can. My bad.

Here is another link: http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/huberthumphey1948dnc.html

Posted by V | August 16, 2012 1:43 PM

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Barack Obama, 2004? Honestly, that and Sarah Palin's 2008 speech are the only ones I can recall watching.

Posted by Kevin Watterson | August 16, 2012 2:00 PM

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Obama's speech in 2004 left me wondering, "Why isn't *this* guy running?"

Then Lurch took the podium, and we all know how that turned out.

Posted by Disco | August 16, 2012 2:07 PM

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Audio over a still video, but here's the Humphrey speech on YouTube.

Posted by Kat S | August 16, 2012 2:07 PM

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I seem to remember Reagan's 1992 speech on behalf of his former VP being pretty impressive, but I was only 16 at the time, so I may be wrong.

Posted by Sam | August 16, 2012 3:41 PM

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I always remember Heather Lamm's speech to the 1996 Reform Party, probably because it was the first time I saw someone really engaged me, a fellow Gen X'er.

She get's introduced in the 59th minute of this Video.

http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/73974-1

"We need a party that is socially tolerant, and fiscally realistic."

Posted by gml4 | August 17, 2012 4:19 PM

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