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After Al Gore accepted his party's presidential nomination at the DNC, which was in Los Angeles in 2000, his then-wife Tipper came on stage. He embraced her for a long, open-mouthed kiss before the cameras.
Richard Nixon's acceptance speech at the 1968 RNC in Miami Beach, Florida, was a pivotal moment in his political comeback. Following his defeat to JFK in 1960 and Pat Brown in the 1962 California gubernatorial race, Nixon aimed to rebrand himself as the future president of the forgotten Americans.
Following eight years of Republican leadership under Dwight D. Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy's 1960 campaign focused on change. Playing off FDR's "New Deal," his acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles looked to a "New Frontier."
At the 1984 DNC, New York Governor Mario Cuomo delivered his "Tale of Two Cities" keynote address, taking aim at President Ronald Reagan's description of the nation as "a shining city upon a hill." Considered one of the best speeches by Cuomo, he said: "There is despair, Mr. President, in the faces that you don't see, in the places that you don't visit in your shining city."
In 1932, Franklin D. Roosevelt broke tradition by delivering the first in-person acceptance speech during the Democratic National Convention (DNC) in Chicago. His "New Deal" speech promised security and aid to those in need.
In one of the oddest convention moments at the 2012 RNC, Clint Eastwood stood on stage next to an empty chair and held an imaginary conversation with President Barack Obama.
At the 2016 Democratic National Convention, Khizr Khan, the father of a Muslim-American soldier who was killed in the Iraq War, delivered a passionate appeal for voters to support Hillary Clinton. He accused Donald Trump of sacrificing "nothing" and "smearing the character" of religious minorities. In one moment of his speech, Khan pulled a pocket-sized Constitution and offered to lend it to Trump.
That same RNC, former professional wrestler Hulk Hogan took to the stage with a frenetic speech, referring to Trump as his hero and performing his trademark T-shirt rip.
Sources: (Stacker) (ABC News) (History)
See also: 15 US vice presidents who became presidents themselves
At the RNC convention in 2016 nominating Donald Trump, his wife, Melania, made a speech with sections taken from a 2008 address by Michelle Obama.
The 2024 RNC closing night came just five days after an assassination attempt on Donald Trump during his rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. Trump appeared at the convention wearing a large bandage on his wounded right ear. This resulted in several attendees wearing fake bandages to show their support.
The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in a highly unusual election year, including an unconventional, remote Democratic National Convention in 2020.
Alaska Governor Sarah Palin accepted her nomination as the Republican Party's vice presidential candidate alongside John McCain at the RNC. She famously said. "You know what they say the difference is between a hockey mom and a pit bull? Lipstick!"
Many Americans were introduced to Barack Obama in 2004 when the Illinois state senator delivered his keynote speech at the DNC in Boston. Obama delivered the now-famous line: "There's not a liberal America and a conservative America, there's the United States of America."
When Barack Obama was nominated as the Democratic Party's presidential candidate in 2008, Senator Ted Kennedy, who was diagnosed with brain cancer, made his farewell appearance. Known as the "Lion of the Senate," Kennedy was surrounded on stage by family.
In an attempt to paint his opponent Michael Dukakis as a tax-and-spend Democrat, George H.W. Bush made a bold promise to supporters at the RNC: "Read my lips: no new taxes." However, during his term, Bush signed multiple tax increases into law.
At the Republican National Convention in 1988, outgoing President Ronald Reagan bid farewell to an emotional crowd in New Orleans, where George H.W. Bush accepted the party's nomination.
With a famously sharp wit, Texas state treasurer and later governor Ann Richards delighted the audience at the DNC with her comments on George H.W. Bush. "Poor George. He can't help it," she said. "He was born with a silver foot in his mouth."
The first woman nominated to be the vice presidential candidate of a major US party accepted her honor at the DNC in 1984. The crowd went wild with just her opening words: "My name is Geraldine Ferraro." Despite the warm support, Ferraro's ticket with presidential nominee Walter Mondale lost 49 out of 50 states in the general election.
In 1980, President Jimmy Carter made an unfortunate gaffe at the DNC with the name "Hubert Horatio Hornblower!... Humphrey!" in a tribute to the former vice president and presidential candidate Hubert Humphrey who died in 1978. Carter mixed up the politician's name with the fictional character Horatio Hornblower, a British naval officer in books by C.S. Forester.
Seeking the Democratic Party's presidential nomination with his Rainbow Coalition campaign, Rev. Jessie Jackson gave a memorable speech in which he described his constituency as "the desperate, the damned, the disinherited, the disrespected, and the despised. They are restless and seek relief." But in a call for unity, he said, "Even in our fractured state, all of us count, and all of us fit somewhere."
Representative Barbara Jordan of Texas became the first Black woman to deliver the keynote address to a DNC in 1976. In her speech, she said: "We are a people in a quandary about the present. We are a people in search of our future. We are a people in search of a national community."
At the 1980 DNC, Senator Ted Kennedy ended his challenge to unseat President Jimmy Carter, but delivered a speech that didn't really support Carter. Kennedy's performance was seen as taking steam out of Carter's reelection bid, and Republican Ronald Reagan won the election that year.
The 1968 DNC was famously torn apart over issues of civil rights and the Vietnam War. Then-Georgia state legislator Julian Bond led an alternate delegation, where he was nominated to be vice president as a protest candidate. At 28 years old, Bond was seven years too young to be eligible and withdrew his name from the ballot.
NBC television reporter John Chancellor was arrested in 1964 at the Republican National Convention (RNC) in San Francisco. He had refused to leave when efforts were made to clear reporters from the convention floor following Barry Goldwater's nomination.
The 1968 DNC featured hundreds of protestors who were arrested and injured outside on the streets of Chicago. Inside, Connecticut Senator Abe Ribicoff accused Chicago Mayor Richard Daley of "Gestapo tactics."
Delegates to the 1964 Democratic National Convention were brought to tears by a moving video tribute to the late JFK, who had been assassinated less than a year earlier. The tribute was introduced by an emotional Robert Kennedy, who was also assassinated four years later during his run for president.
At the DNC in 1948, where Harry Truman's name was at the top of the ballot, dozens of delegates from Mississippi and Alabama walked out in opposition to the party's civil rights platform. The Southern delegates broke away and founded their own States' Rights Democratic Party.
At that same heated DNC, legendary CBS reporter Dan Rather scuffled with security guards on the floor and could be heard saying: "Take your hands off me, unless you're planning to arrest me."
Since 1832, political national conventions, held every four years, have been crucial for political parties and individual candidates in preparing for the presidential elections. These conventions are highlighted by speeches from keynotes, spouses, family members, celebrities, running mates, and, since 1932, acceptance speeches from the party's presidential nominee. These historic gatherings have featured political stars, soaring rhetoric, and even violent clashes.
So, from a former wrestler ripping his shirt off to a nation grieving their assassinated head of state, click on for historic moments from America's political conventions.
Shocking moments from past political conventions
From memorable speeches to some truly bizarre incidents
LIFESTYLE Politics
Since 1832, political national conventions, held every four years, have been crucial for political parties and individual candidates in preparing for the presidential elections. These conventions are highlighted by speeches from keynotes, spouses, family members, celebrities, running mates, and, since 1932, acceptance speeches from the party's presidential nominee. These historic gatherings have featured political stars, soaring rhetoric, and even violent clashes.
So, from a former wrestler ripping his shirt off to a nation grieving their assassinated head of state, click on for historic moments from America's political conventions.