A parade of Democratic superdelegates stepped forward to declare their allegiance to Senator Barack Obama, placing him on the cusp of clinching the party’s presidential nomination on Tuesday evening after surviving an epic battle with Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton.
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The 16-month primary campaign, which wound through every state and U.S. territory, drew to its final hours with a burst of announcements — delegate by delegate — that pushed Mr. Obama closer to crossing the threshold of 2,118 delegates needed to be formally nominated at this summer’s Democratic convention in Denver.
He was within a dozen delegates of securing enough delegates for the nomination, according to the campaign’s tally. New superdelegate endorsements were pouring in through the afternoon, and Mr. Obama’s advisers believed they would reach the nomination mark on Tuesday evening. As voters were casting their ballots on Tuesday in South Dakota and Montana, the final stops on the Democratic calendar, the focal point of the race centered on the uncommitted superdelegates on Capitol Hill and across the country who rushed to pledge their loyalty to Mr. Obama and praise the orchestration of his campaign.
Every time a new endorsement was announced, campaign workers sounded a round of applause in Mr. Obama’s headquarters in Chicago.
“Charisma is formidable but not enough. A president has to be able to manage as well as lead,” said Representative John Spratt, Democrat of South Carolina, who was among the new supporters. “I think Barack Obama has proved that he can do both by organizing a national campaign that has trumped his senior, more experienced colleagues.”
The moment the polls close in South Dakota, marking the official end of the nominating season — at 9 p.m. Eastern — a delegation of at least eight members of Congress who had been holding out until after the primaries will announce their support of Mr. Obama, according to Mr. Obama’s aides. Former President Jimmy Carter has also said he would back Mr. Obama, telling The Associated Press that he would announce his endorsement after the polls close on Tuesday night.
Election officials in both Montana and South Dakota expected above average turnout on Tuesday. Chris Nelson, the South Dakota Secretary of State, said he was expected Democratic turnout at 40-45 percent, although he said that news reports predicting an end to the campaign could lessen voters’ enthusiasm.
“Certainly if anybody’s paying attention to the media, there are these subtle signals that it may be over,” Mr. Nelson said. "Certainly that may lessen the enthusiasm.”
Mrs. Clinton and a few close advisers huddled at her home in Chappaqua, making a variety of telephone calls and discussing the next steps, including the timing of her departure from the race.
On a conference call with members of the New York Congressional delegation, Mrs. Clinton was asked whether she would be open to joining a ticket with Mr. Obama. She replied that she would do whatever she could — including a vice presidential bid — to help Democrats win the White House.
Several Democrats familiar with the call, who spoken on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak about it, also said Mrs. Clinton told colleagues that she would not end her candidacy on Tuesday evening and asked for their patience.
Even though advisers to Mrs. Clinton conceded that her path to the nomination had effectively closed, she was still spending the day calling some superdelegates. Jon Ausman, a Florida member of the Democratic National Committee, said he was leaning toward supporting Mr. Obama until Mrs. Clinton telephoned on Tuesday morning.
After the longest nominating contest in recent history with 57 contests in all, news organizations rushed to declare an end to primary on Tuesday. The Associated Press issued a news alert at 1:23 p.m. Eastern, saying Mr. Obama “effectively clinches Democratic nomination, based on assured delegates in last primaries.”
There was, of course, stagecraft all around.
Mr. Obama was staging an evening victory celebration in St. Paul, Minn., inside the same arena where Senator John McCain of Arizona is expected to formally accept the Republican nomination at the party’s summer convention in September. In the eyes of both campaigns, Minnesota is also considered a key battleground state.
Aides to Mrs. Clinton said that, should Mr. Obama cross the line Tuesday night — and be declared at least the presumptive nominee, their candidate would acknowledge his accomplishment, without going so far as to drop out.
Mrs. Clinton’s aides said they thought it was hardly certain that Mr. Obama would be able to do that tonight.
What could go wrong?
Well, a few things. For one, although Mr. Obama seems in a clear position to win in Montana, the situation is not as clear in South Dakota, a state where there is no real history of Democratic primaries and where polling — at least as suggested by the divergent polls coming out of there — appears dicey. Mrs. Clinton and Bill Clinton have campaigned heavily in that state in the final hours, reflecting the sense in the Clinton campaign — and at least some worry in the Obama campaign — of the uncertainty of the outcome there.
A loss by Mr. Obama in South Dakota would probably not derail his hopes for the nomination; it does appear that the train has left the station, and there are not enough delegates at stake there to put Mrs. Clinton back in the delegate hunt. Still, it would mean that Mr. Obama would be ending the contest on a sour note, and one that would serve to reinforce many of the concerns Democrats have voiced about him as he has staggered through the second half of the primary season — in particular, that he is having trouble competing with Mrs. Clinton among white blue-collar workers.
The fact that voting results won’t start coming in until late in the evening could also complicate things for Mr. Obama. He would no doubt prefer to make his speech after the two states have been called, but if South Dakota is close, that could prove complicated.
The other factor that might distract from Mr. Obama’s attempt to move on Tuesday night is Mrs. Clinton. There have been some media reports over the past 24 hours suggesting that she may suspend her campaign with her speech in New York Tuesday, which would permit Mr. Obama to pivot cleanly to the general election. Her associates say, though, that this outcome is highly unlikely, and suggest looking for something more like a farewell address for now, an ambivalent coda to the evening. If she does suspend her campaign — and that does seem a likely outcome — it will be sometime over the next few days.
And finally, consider this: If Mrs. Clinton pulls out a victory in South Dakota, it could very well give her the impetus — and the ammunition — to make the case to superdelegates that Mr. Obama is an anemic general-election candidate and that the party should turn to her. That result could make her delay an exit even longer.
Julie Bosman, John Sullivan and Sarah Wheaton contributed reporting.
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