WASHINGTON – On the verge of his coronation as chairman of the Democratic National Committee, Howard Dean said he will “restructure” the party and take his fight into the heart of Republican-controlled “red states.”

Previewing the acceptance speech he will give after votes are cast on Saturday, Dr. Dean told a gathering of state party leaders from across the country that he will spend a “disproportionate amount of my time” in states that Democrats had all but abandoned in the last election.

President Clinton, speaking at a tribute last night for the outgoing DNC chairman, Terence McAuliffe, said the party had to learn “a few lessons,” including becoming more united and using better tactics to define the party’s message.

“We need to brand ourselves better,” Mr. Clinton said, as he praised Dr. Dean’s “energy and passion.”

The former governor of Vermont built a cult-like following among the most liberal wing of the Democratic Party with blunt criticism of the Iraq war and Internet-based fund-raising. Lately, however, he has remodeled his public image into that of a pragmatic centrist who could appeal to voters in the South and other regions where President Bush won in November.

Openly anticipating objections that is he is a Yankee who is too liberal to be an effective emissary for the party in those states, Dr. Dean stressed that that he had balanced his state’s budget, received eight consecutive endorsements from the National Rifle Association, and shares Vice President Cheney’s views on civil unions for same-sex couples.

And while many Democrats attending this weekend’s winter meeting to anoint Dr. Dean as their leader agreed with his goal of rebuilding the grassroots of their party, they were less united on what message to present to do so.

The acting director of the Alabama Democratic Party, Jim Spearman, said Democrats “have got to give a centrist message” in order to win his state and others that voted for Mr. Bush. “We’ve got to talk about hunting and fishing rights, family farms,” he said. “We’ve got to quit letting Republicans define our values.”

Dr. Dean would be a “tough sell” in Alabama “because the media has labeled him,” said Mr. Spearman. But he said he would emphasize that Dr. Dean was a “fiscally conservative” governor.

The vice chairwoman of the Utah Democratic Party, Nancy Jane Woodside, who is running for the vice chairmanship, said she was optimistic about Dr. Dean’s prospects. She praised him for campaigning in her state last year and creating a grassroots organization “like none we have ever seen.”

“I feel the hope. I feel we can build a vision that will resonate in the red states,” she said. “We’ll have to do the hard work of showing up in every little county and building the party from the ground up.”

Ms. Woodside praised Dr. Dean’s plan to review the plans and finances of every state committee, and she criticized the party’s past leadership as “so far removed” from the needs of red states “that it could fall off the East Coast.”

A former congressman from Indiana, Tim Roemer, who had sought the party chairmanship, wrote in the Washington Post yesterday that the Democratic Party has much “soul-searching” to do in order to win back voters who are pro-life and differ from the party base on other issues.

Mr. Roemer praised Senator Clinton for calling on Democrats to seek “common ground” with opponents of abortion, and he cited the Republicans’ embrace of pro-choice candidates such as Rudolph Giuliani and Arnold Schwarzenegger.

But others bristled at the suggestion.

The Reverend Al Sharpton called Mrs. Clinton’s suggestion “a flawed strategy.”

“Democrats have been going to the right since 1988, and it hasn’t worked,” he said in an interview after Dr. Dean’s speech.

“The definition of insanity is to do the same thing over and over and think you’re going to get a different result,” he said.

Rev. Sharpton praised Dr. Dean’s plan to rebuild the grassroots of the party, and he blamed the Democrats’ defeat in November in part on focusing their energies on swing states and bringing in “outside armies” of allied liberal groups to run advertisements and register voters.

As Dr. Dean’s opponents dropped one by one out of the race to become DNC chairman – until there was no one left – the party leaders fell in behind him.

Calling Dr. Dean not only a political friend but also a personal one, Senator Kerry last night said Democrats do not need to reinvent themselves to attract voters.

“This great party of ours doesn’t need a makeover. This party doesn’t need some massive shift,” said the Massachusetts senator and former presidential candidate, who earlier announced he was giving $1 million to the DNC to support Dr. Dean’s grassroots efforts. “This party is poised to win in the future,” he said

At the event last night, which was emceed by the liberal radio host Al Franken, party officials praised Mr. McAuliffe for bringing the party out of debt and modernizing its technology and organization.

Dr. Dean drew enthusiastic applause from his audience yesterday by pledging to funnel more money into state parties that are not considered swing-states. But he told state officials he would be visiting to check on their results.

“The hard news is that you have to deliver,” he said. Rebuilding the party “will be very difficult,” he said.

Echoing the populist theme of his failed campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination a year ago, he told state party officials: “This is not my chairmanship, it is our chairmanship.”