Insights
How to Read a Convention
Published on August 13, 2024
With the announcement of Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as Vice President Kamala Harris’s running mate, the last unsettled piece of convention season has fallen into place. Aaron Sorkin devotees who long for the drama of an open convention will again be disappointed. However, Washington professionals can now move on to the more straightforward question – what do conventions mean these days, and what can they get out of it? To answer that question, we should take a look back at conventions of the past for ideas of what this year’s conventions might forecast for the future.
First, we found that while veep selections may move electoral votes, they don’t often signal much about the direction of a party. Let’s start with the exceptions. In retrospect, you can definitely see the dawn of the populist Trump era in the 2008 selection of Sarah Palin as John McCain’s running mate. But you’d never guess that by looking at the 2012 RNC, which paired mild-mannered budget hawk Mitt Romney with mild-mannered budget hawk Paul Ryan. The 2016 selection of Mike Pence as Trump’s running mate seemed to signal that Trump was embracing the evangelical movement. But it worked out the other way around, with evangelicals accommodating themselves to Trump, eventually abandoning Pence, and cheering the selection of the much more devoted Trumper, JD Vance, as the new GOP running mate.
On the Democratic side, running mate selections have been notable mainly for their appeal to voters, not ideological reasons. The nomination of Kamala Harris for President was made possible by her selection as running mate four years ago, the culmination of a long evolution for a party that denied Fannie Lou Hamer a credential to the 1964 convention. From Geraldine Ferraro to Joe Lieberman, Democratic VP nods have signaled many historical firsts. But for running mates that signaled genuine policy shifts you have to go back to the literal smoke-filled room that forced FDR to abandon New Dealer VP Henry Wallace for moderate Harry Truman in 1944.
Historically speaking, even the most significant figures to hold the VP title got “promoted” to the office by party regulars to move them out of power, not into it. John Adams, Teddy Roosevelt, Richard Nixon, and Lyndon Johnson all meet this description. So while JD Vance and Tim Walz may influence the election with their statements and campaign prowess, and may even become president someday, don’t spend too much time analyzing what their nominations mean for the future direction of their parties.
So, let’s look at the top of the ticket. What have conventions historically signaled about the standard bearer for President? Again, not much. Acceptance speeches are almost universally good, but never great. By the time the convention rolls around, the nominee is such a known commodity who has delivered so many speeches the pressure is mainly not to screw things up. Accepting the nomination requires humility and pride, bombast and cooperation, red meat for the immediate crowd, and a gentle embrace of the entire viewing audience. The result is usually meh. Even when a nominee goes off script, it’s to deliver more of the same campaign trail material.
It’s been a century since the last genuinely open convention, and the nominees didn’t deliver speeches back then. So, really, there’s never been an acceptance speech that made news beyond a few pull quotes and a bounce in the polls based more on demeanor than message. So, watch Vice President Harris’s speech, but don’t expect much news out of the evening.
How about the other speeches? Here, we find more genuine historical fodder. FDR, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama all delivered superstar speeches at the convention four years before the convention in which they became the standard bearer. Ronald Reagan’s star turn came 16 years before his own nomination, with a speech that became gospel for a generation of conservative activists.
Speeches by Ann Richards and Jesse Jackson in 1988, Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2004, and Tim Scott in 2020 all elevated the profile of their messengers as a separate brand from the nominees at their conventions. Speeches can also signal policy shifts, like the prominent role given to AIDS activist Mary Fisher at the 1992 Republican National Convention. They can also mark shifting political winds, such as the speech by Teamsters President Sean O’Brien at this year’s RNC.
But mostly, the choice of messengers and topics given prime slots says more about a party’s direction than the words delivered in those speeches. July’s RNC featured personal stories from crime victims and law enforcement, particularly related to illegal immigration, underscoring the focus on crime and immigration in the Republican platform. Very few speeches mentioned the national debt or deficit, a shift from previous RNCs that is also reflected by the removal of the topic in the RNC platform. The final notable shift in both platform and speeches for the RNC was on LGBTQ+-related issues, signaling a heavy focus on social issues for the party as it continues to de-emphasize fiscal discipline.
Expect a lineup of unity speeches and platform points for the DNC that lean on the party’s current polling advantage and away from intra-party rifts. More Ukraine than Gaza. More abortion than policing. Infrastructure and jobs, not taxes and inflation. A speech from Joe Biden defining a strong legacy and endorsement of Vice President Harris. An otherwise forward-looking, diverse, and, above all, youthful slate of speakers focused on the future.
These platform and messenger shifts are probably the most useful tools for gauging where a party’s focus will be in the future, regardless of the success of their standard bearer in the general election.
While certain messengers and topics are influenced by both their candidate and their expected opponent, party watchers should focus more on the choices reflected in the platforms and the lower slate of speakers, instead of reading too much into the big speeches themselves.
And of course, the main point of a convention is never the main event. To paraphrase Paul Newman in The Color of Money, the real game is in the practice room. Conference attendees can expect exorbitant hotel costs, intense protests, poor credentials, and tons of traffic. But it’s still a good room. Speaking to local party officials, watching who draws the backstage crowd, attending the parties, and following the money will always make the most boring of conventions an interesting affair for those who can look beyond the immediate race and focus on what it all means for the future.
Cori Smith Kramer is CEO of Center Forward, which brings together members of Congress, not-for-profits, academic experts, trade associations, corporations and unions to find common ground and give voice to the center of the American electorate.