Taylor thanked supporters of the socialist campaign for inviting him “to see the reality facing working people in Utah,” explain the common threads with his experiences in Pennsylvania, and campaign for the SWP ticket of Róger Calero for president and Arrin Hawkins for vice president.

Taylor was the featured guest at a barbeque later that day at the home of a campaign supporter. His presentation was followed by a lively give-and-take. Dale Brackett, a 20-year-old steelworker, asked to take a stack of campaign handouts to distribute in the next weeks. “We have a one-party system,” Bracket said. “You might as well call it the Capitalists’ Party,” instead of the Democrats and Republicans. “There is no sense in talking about a lesser evil. It’s just evil.”

Taylor responded that this is the easier part to see. The other “third parties,” like the Libertarians or the Greens, are pro-capitalist too, he said. The same is true of the Nader/Camejo “independent” campaign that serves as left pressure on the Democrats.

Brackett said he had just finished reading the Communist Manifesto, a pamphlet he picked up when he met socialist campaigners in September. He took advantage of Taylor’s visit to talk with the senatorial candidate for several hours throughout the day and ended up buying four more books on revolutionary politics.

The following morning, five Co-Op miners gave Taylor a tour of the site of their 10-month picket line outside the coal mine in a Huntington canyon.

In Price, Taylor spoke at the Militant Labor Forum hall that afternoon to more than a dozen workers and their families, most of them also miners at Co-Op. Celso Panduro presented Taylor with a commemorative T-shirt from the one-year anniversary of the ongoing fight for the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA) at the mine.

Taylor urged the miners to vote for Calero and Hawkins, who are on the ballot in Utah, and support the socialist ticket in every other possible way.

Taylor ended his presentation by reading some messages to the miners at Co-Op from his co-workers in UMWA Local 1248 at Maple Creek’s High Quality mine. These union members eagerly await the Co-Op miners joining them in the UMWA, he said.

In the discussion that followed, one participant asked if the socialist campaign’s efforts to effect revolutionary change is legal in this country. “I have seen many people get in trouble fighting for these things in Central America,” this worker said.

Drawing on their past year of experience in struggle, several coal miners and one of their spouses joined in the discussion. Among them were Juan and Rosa Salazar.

“We have rights, we are workers,” said Juan, a leader of the union organizing fight at Co-Op. “The bosses can’t treat us as badly anymore. They used to order us around freely—now they think twice. If they do something to one of us, they know that now they may be facing 50 of us.”

“I agree with what the miners have been doing here. Don’t just take it,” added Rosa. “You have to do something to fight back. It has been very hard, but worth it.”

Participants stayed after the program for refreshments and political discussion with Taylor and local campaign supporters. One miner bought a subscription to the Militant and picked out dozens of copies of the paper from recent months to have as a chronicle of the Co-Op struggle.
 
 
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