Stump speech (politics) Stump speech (politics) A political stump speech is a standard speech used by a politician running for office. Typically a candidate who schedules many appearances prepares a short standardized stump speech that is repeated verbatim to each audience, before opening to questions. The term derives from the early American custom in which candidates campaigned from town to town and stood upon a sawed off tree stump to deliver their speech. In presidential campaigns in the United States, a candidate's speech at his or her party's presidential nominating convention usually forms the basis for the stump speech for the duration of
A Tale of Two Cities (speech) more important than content on such occasions, he convinces the conventioneers that they are the children of light, destined to push back the darkness." A spokesman for the Reagan presidential campaign stated that the speech was "a well-crafted litany of cheap shots and half-truths." Nevertheless, Reagan deemed Cuomo's rhetorical appeals to working-class voters to be of threatening strength and re-orientated his campaign to ensure their support. Reagan defeated Mondale in a landslide in the November election. Richard Greene opined that due to this fact and that many of the issues Cuomo highlighted were not subsequently addressed, the speech failed in