Candidates make pre-Super Tuesday push

— -- The remaining presidential hopefuls are wrapping up their last full day of campaigning Monday before the Super Tuesday primaries, with top Republicans exchanging comments on their conservative credentials and the Democrats focusing efforts on the Northeast.

Republican front-runner John McCain hosted a rally Monday in Boston's historic Faneuil Hall — less than a mile from the Massachusetts statehouse where chief rival Mitt Romney once worked as governor.

"I believe we have a shot" in the Bay State, McCain told the crowd packed into the mid-18th Century meeting hall near the harbor.

"As president of the United States, I will preserve my proud conservative Republican credentials, but I will reach across the aisle and work together for the good of this country," McCain said. He has made similar statements at many recent rallies.

The Arizona senator did well the Northeast in his 2000 race against George W. Bush. In 2008, he hopes it will resolve his race against Romney and former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee, who is focusing on the South on Monday.

"I hope to bring it to a close tomorrow," McCain told reporters.

In Tennessee, Romney and his supporters questioned McCain's conservative credentials.

"Across the country, conservatives have come together and they say, 'You know what? We don't want Senator McCain. We want a conservative,' " Romney said at a campaign stop in Nashville.

"It's narrowed down to a two-person race and to the extent it's a two-person race, I'll win. I've got the conservative support of the mainstream of my party," he said.

Former senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, campaigning for Romney in Nashville, warned supporters of "the bigwigs who are lining up like lemmings" behind McCain.

Boston was a popular location for campaign stops Monday, with McCain and Democrats Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama all scheduled to appear there.

Clinton also is expected to visit New Haven, Conn.; Wooster, Mass., and New York City, while Obama also visits East Rutherford, N.J., and Hartford, Conn. Romney, like Huckabee, is looking to the South, with stops in Nashville and Atlanta before traveling to California for an appearance in Long Beach.