The phrase "a time when convention" is correct and usable in written English.
It can be used to refer to a specific period or moment characterized by adherence to established norms or practices.
Example: "In the 1950s, it was a time when convention dictated the roles of men and women in society."
Alternatives: "an era of tradition" or "a period of established norms".
At a time when conventions no longer decide nominations, they still provide a testing place where candidacies can either soar or flop.
It's high summer, a time when, by convention, magazines are given over to gloriously photographed picnic features, many of which I have contributed to.
It takes one back to the age of the well-tailored play and a time when political conventions were contests, rather than coronations.
That's all fine as far as it goes, but does little to illuminate what the opera is actually about, which is a wry take on growing up and growing older, set at a time when class conventions and pretensions defined the parameters of how such things should be managed.
THERE was a time when the annual convention of the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada drew a crowd of rough characters from Canada's northern bush intent on whooping it up in the big city and telling tall tales to financiers about their mining claims.
This may simply reflect the fact that the incumbent's convention is often held at a time when the challenger's convention was recent enough to still have some effect on the numbers.
At a time when public interest in political conventions is already in decline, the G.O.P. convention may have in effect been an anticommercial -- Don't Watch This! -- for Mr. Gore's convention next Monday in Los Angeles.
Say that Mr. Romney holds a seven-point lead in a North Carolina poll conducted in the immediate aftermath of next week's Republican National Convention, a time when Mr. Romney might be enjoying a significant bounce in the polls.
Hillary Clinton's best character witness took the stage Tuesday night at the Democratic Convention at a time when Americans' opinions of her have never been worse.
There was a time when politics played openly on the convention floor for the elucidation, delight and possibly the dismay of the American people.
