What about this scenario?

[solarstorm]

Clinton refuses to announce her candidacy, but she's been running a quasi-campaign in order to attract media attention.
She hasn't felt certain for a long time about if she really wants to go into the primaries or if she's gonna bow out of politics.
In the end she has decided to yield the floor to her fellow Democrats.

The crux of the problem: No Democrat has dared to challenge her due to pointlessness.

1.) Would she really bow out under such a circumstance?

2.) If so, what would be the deadline to do so?

[Cory]

If she doesn't announce by January or so of 2015 and ultimately decides not to run then she would be blamed for freezing the field and disrupting the other candidates.

It would be kind of inappropriate of her to wait that long to announce that she's not running. I mean c'mon. If she really isn't going to run the Democrats need to know before primary season really goes into full gear (Spring 2015).

[ilikeverin]

It would be rather ironic of her to dither very long, given what Mario Cuomo did in the 1992 campaign.

[solarstorm]

For the first time I've realized that it would be detrimental to the Democratic Party if no one dares to run against Hillary. If she dies or falls ill, she'll leave a vacuum.

[Indy Texas]

She needs to make her intentions known by the end of this year, whether it's yes or no. It would be very harmful to her party to wait any longer than that.