Montes referred to a house meeting organized by some of the strikers a few weeks ago for James Harris, the Socialist Workers candidate for president. "It gives me and other strikers great pleasure to share with you the fact that we enjoyed meeting James Harris in person," he said. "We had a chance to speak to James about the changes in the U.S. government that we would like to see. We would like to see more respect toward people and our right to organize."

He added, "James and Margaret deserve our support because they care about our struggles. They also know that a struggle is not easy--a struggle is hard, but in the end it will lead to victory as long as people remain united. A struggle today is one of the entire labor movement, not only a few. We have to unite for a better tomorrow for our families and future generations."

Andre Thomas spoke to the audience about his victory over Alaska Airlines. Only a few days earlier he was informed that he had won immediate reinstatement to his job and full back pay. The arbitration panel stated that it would organize monitoring of the airline for a year to make sure the employer didn't go after Thomas further.

A customer service representative at Alaska, Thomas was falsely accused of organizing co-workers to call in sick during a contract fight 18 months ago. More than 500 customer service representatives called in sick the day Thomas was accused of orchestrating this.

He described the response he got from co-workers when he visited the Seattle-Tacoma airport earlier in the day before the campaign event. "It was incredible--people were crawling over the ticket counter to hug me and some were crying," he reported. "It wasn't just a victory for me. It was for all of us."

Thomas thanked socialist campaigners for their support in his long fight.

In her talk Margaret Trowe explained that the campaign she and her running mate, James Harris, are waging has reached out to workers and farmers throughout the United States and other countries. She explained that the Socialist Workers campaign is involved in helping strengthen a number of many labor and other social struggles--from the tomato workers who just won a union in Arizona to meat packers on strike in Vancouver, to the national demonstration against police brutality recently held in Washington.

During the discussion period one member of the audience asked what the candidate meant by the term "lawful workings of capitalism." She said this refers to how capitalism works, and to the fact that political and economic developments are not haphazard but are governed by basic laws of the class struggle and political economy that can be understood and anticipated.

"When it works well it is still a system of crisis," she explained. "This system is destructive, and it has to be. The spread of the AIDS epidemic in Africa and its devastating social consequences is an example of the lawful workings of capitalism. It's a result of capitalism's organized exploitation and oppression of Africa."

Another questioner asked about Green Party presidential candidate Ralph Nader. Trowe explained that Nader and the Greens were not trying to build a real third party of any permanence. Instead they acted more as a left wing pressure group of the Democratic Party. "Nader talks a lot about sweatshops overseas but he doesn't talk much about the ones right here. My campaign welcomes immigrant workers who come here--we see them as strengthening the fighting capacity of working people as a whole. Nader says the U.S. government should treat Mexico better so that 'we' won't get so many Mexican immigrants coming here." His campaign, she said, "is part of promoting economic nationalism."

The day after the Seattle campaign rally Trowe traveled to Spokane, Washington. There she participated with several of her campaign supporters in a "Union Appreciation Day" sponsored by the locked-out Kaiser workers, members of the United Steelworkers of America (USWA). About 1,000 Steelworkers and their supporters attended the event.

After two years in which they struck Kaiser for four months and then were locked out for 18 months, these unionists expect to soon be back to work. They are awaiting a decision on a dozen or so issues that went to arbitration.

Trowe was introduced to many of the USWA members, who stated that they were proud of the fight they had waged. She in turn told them about the many labor fights she had seen on her campaign tour and how the fight against Kaiser had helped to set an example. Trowe also met and spent time talking to strikers from Sunnyside, Washington who are on strike against Valley Manufactured Housing. These strikers sold out the hundreds of buttons they had brought to raise money for their food bank.