CHICAGO--About all you'll find in the middle of the road, goes the old Southern saying, is yellow stripes and dead armadillos.

President Clinton is trying to throw the Democratic Party into that eclectic mix as well.

Since the disastrous 1994 midterm elections, when his party lost control of Congress for the first time since 1946, Clinton has found a niche in the center of the political spectrum and surprisingly stayed there.

Clinton's strategy, crafted with help from recently departed adviser Dick Morris, is winning back moderates who abandoned the Democratic party during the 1980s.

He's on the brink of a resounding reelection--the first for a Democratic president since Franklin D. Roosevelt '04 in 1936.

It hasn't come without a price.

As Democrats gathered last month to renominate Clinton and Vice President Al Gore '69, their big tent philosophy showed signs of wear and tear.

Its core constituents, including blacks and organized labor, are upset with the president's move to the center, epitomized by his signature of this summer's welfare reform bill.

And its centrists are still wary, remembering all too well the president's early attempts to allow gays to serve openly in the military and to nationalize health care.

When Democrats cast their ballots November 5, some will do it with enthusiasm, applauding his recent moves to the center.

Others will simply do so because the other choice is worse.

Uniting a Big Tent

As Rev. Jesse L. Jackson finished his emotional plea for party unity, delegates leapt to their feet in applause.

Oregon delegate Ann Phan, 21, scanned the convention floor, chanting "Four more years!" and waving her Clinton/Gore sign into the air.

"What a snapshot of America," said Phan, a first-generation Vietnamese-American. "I believe what Jesse said: in our diversity is strength. It's a tent that holds everybody."