Yet three years after he won election as the party chairman by running largely as an outsider, it is not clear that Mr. Dean has the political skills or the stature with the two campaigns to bring the nominating battle to a relatively quick and unifying conclusion.
Indeed, 24 hours after he made his remarks, Mrs. Clinton said she intended to keep fighting for the nomination through the summer, if necessary. It was an unmistakable rebuke to Mr. Dean, who has never had good relations with the Clintons.
In an interview, Mr. Dean said he was taking steps to pave the way to a smooth convention in Denver this summer, suggesting that he had had private conversations with both campaigns.
Mr. Dean and his aides said they were assembling resources — voter lists, political organizations and polling on vulnerabilities of Senator John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee. Beyond that, Mr. Dean and other Democrats argued that with the party so divided — and in the midst of a fight between two outsized political figures — there were limits to what he could, or should, do.
“I’m making calls all the time to people,” he said. “I’ve spoken to a great number of leaders who are not aligned. The operative thing here is let the voters get to have their say before the Washington politicians have their say.”
Still, senior officials in both campaigns said they had heard rarely from Mr. Dean on matters like the tone of the contest and how it might be concluded and what to do about the Michigan and Florida delegates, the subject of a bitter and potentially debilitating debate between the Clinton and Obama campaigns.
The chairman of the Florida Democratic Party, Karen Thurman, said she could not recall the last time Mr. Dean had called her to try work out the dispute. She and other Florida Democrats are to meet with Mr. Dean on Wednesday to try to persuade him to agree to a compromise.
Some Democratic Party leaders, while offering sympathy for Mr. Dean’s plight, said it was urgent that he take a more assertive role to restore peace. Several suggested that Mr. Dean — who has sought to build a legacy by expanding party operations to all 50 states — risked having his tenure as party leader remembered for a traumatizing loss in a year where most Democrats think victory should be easy.
“I think he should be talking to governors and Al Gore and John Kerry,” said Donald Fowler, a former party chairman who supports Mrs. Clinton. “I think he should be convening almost daily conversations with people — including the campaigns — trying to reach a solution.”
“If I were a chair, I would be a little more public in what I was doing and suggesting,” Mr. Fowler said. “The D.N.C. chair rarely has an opportunity to do stuff, but this is one of those occasions.”
Gov. Phil Bredesen of Tennessee drew attention last month when he proposed a solution: Have the elected Democratic officials and party leaders known as superdelegates convene after the voting is done on June 3 to resolve the fight. Mr. Bredesen said he had acted in part because he saw no evidence that Mr. Dean or other leaders were trying to resolve the situation.
“What I try to do is when I see a problem to step up,” Mr. Bredesen said. “I think the party needs to take a hand in this thing.” ‘
Mr. Dean, a reserved former governor of Vermont, goes home most weekends and spends most of his weekdays on the road. In Washington, he stays at a hotel. His approach and style offer a sharp contrast to a string of big-shoulder, high-profile party chairmen —Terry McAuliffe or the late Ron H. Brown — who rose through the party ranks and were fixtures at the parties, fund-raisers and restaurants that make up this city’s political culture and where much of the political conversation takes place.
He in many ways ran for chairman as a candidate defying the Democratic establishment, and his first years were marked by a very public feud with Representative Rahm Emanuel, Democrat of Illinois, over Mr. Dean’s trademark proposal to use Democratic National Committee money to build organizations in all 50 states. He does not have particularly close relationships with many of the people who are central to the Clinton and Obama campaigns or Washington Democratic players.
“I have never heard from him,” said Charles T. Manatt, who was chairman of the Democratic National Committee from 1981 to 1985. “But he is a totally different style from someone like me who came in through the party process. Dean doesn’t live in town so he hasn’t connected with a lot of people in town.” |
