BY MAURICE WILLIAMS AND JOHN HARDING
Supporters of the Militant and its Spanish-language sister
magazine, Perspectiva Mundial, will kick off a four-week
international subscription renewal campaign starting February
6 and ending March 7. This will be combined with a single
sales campaign for both publications. Goals for the sales
effort will be printed in the next issue of the Militant.
Socialist workers and members of the Young Socialists will
use the campaign to reach out to workers involved in labor
struggles and farmers fighting to stay on the land. It's an
opportunity to deepen collaboration with workers, farmers,
students, and others who have been reading the Militant and
expand the paper's long-term readership. The Militant urges
its supporters to send in notes, articles, and especially
photos about sales activities and upcoming political events.
Below is a report on a sales team supporters in Boston
organized in Massachusetts and New Hampshire. Any readers
interested in joining sales teams in your area should contact
supporters in the cities listed on page 8.
BOSTON - Six supporters of the Militant visited garment shops, textile mills, and a meatpacking plant last week.
In Manchester, New Hampshire, we visited Jac-Pac, a beef processing plant where 600 members of the United Food and Commercial Workers work. A large number of workers are Mexican, and union members at the plant say the issue of immigration has become big in the area. Workers bought six copies of PM and four of the Militant.
South of Manchester, which is on the Merrimack River where rows of abandoned textile mills still stand, is Lawrence, Massachusetts, home of Malden Mills. Workers there are members of the Union of Needletrades, Industrial, and Textile Employees (UNITE). Socialists organize weekly sales of the Militant and PM at the plant gate.
There are also large garment shops in Lawrence, such as Grieco Brothers, and a production plant for New Balance running shoes. Workers at the New Balance distribution warehouse in the city have won a fight to get the company to recognize UNITE as their union, but they still do not have a contract. We had an afternoon sale at the UNITE-organized Grieco Brothers, where one worker bought a copy of the Militant.
In the south of Massachusetts lies another old center of textile and garment manufacturing in Fall River and New Bedford. The area is also a major center of cranberry farming. Both of these cities are made up in a substantial majority of immigrants from Portugal. Three workers bought the Militant at Duro Finishing, organized by UNITE.
We also spoke to several fishermen at the docks in New Bedford. Some 1,200 fishermen work on about 300 boats, owned and operated for the most part by individual working fishermen. Many of the boats were idle that day. One fisherman said that due to declining fish stocks the government has cut their fishing days to 120 per year.