BY NAOMI CRAINE
At Labor Day events, opening sessions of universities,
and activities in defense of the Cuban revolution,
supporters of the Militant are warming up for a subscription
drive to win new readers. The international sales campaign
will begin September 23 and last eight weeks, through
November 19. During this period supporters of the socialist
press will focus their political efforts on meeting workers,
farmers, students, and other political activists who have
never been introduced to the socialist press before, and
sign them up for a subscription to the Militant, or its
Spanish-language sister magazine Perspectiva Mundial, as
well as sell them a copy of the Marxist magazine New
International.
Militant supporters in many cities have already taken goals for the drive; others are still discussing them. Now that the dates are set, activists in local areas have an opportunity to review their plans and make sure they have come up with a challenging goal for the eight-week drive. The international goals for this campaign will be announced in the issue of the Militant printed September 21, together with a chart of local goals and targets adopted by supporters in the trade unions.
Sales of the Militant were especially high in Detroit over the Labor Day weekend, as thousands of unionists rallied to support striking newspaper workers. Distributors report sales of 126 copies of the Militant, the big majority at strike-related activities. Two unionists bought introductory subscriptions, and another asked to be called back about a sub.
Supporters in Des Moines also report a good response at the Labor Day celebration there. They are petitioning to put the Socialist Workers candidate for mayor, John Cox, on the ballot. Campaigners staffed a booth at the event, where they got 82 signatures and sold several copies of the Militant.
Workers at these events and others across the country were interested in the Militant's working-class perspective on everything from the Detroit newspaper strike to the war in the former Yugoslavia, the women's conference in Beijing, and the Cuban revolution.
In Chicago, Militant supporters have decided to organize several regional sales trips over the fall to two universities in Indiana where there are members of the Young Socialists. One team has already hit the road. It is helping to build a September 6 public meeting at Indiana University in Bloomington and a September 7 event at Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana, featuring speakers who attended the Cuba Lives International Youth Festival. The teams will be setting up literature tables and introducing many new people to the socialist press.
Militant correspondents Laura Garza and Maggie Trowe, who are in Beijing at the United Nations Conference on Women, have so far sold 12 Militant subscriptions to participants in that gathering, as well as more than $150 worth of socialist books and dozens of copies of the Militant and Perspectiva Mundial. They report a lot of interest in Cuba and in the case of Mumia Abu-Jamal. New subscribers are from Bangladesh, South Africa, Canada, Finland, the United States, and elsewhere. Two women from Brazil subscribed to Perspectiva Mundial.
The first week of the drive, September 23 to October 1, will be a target week, with the aim of starting the international sales campaign with a bang. We ask distributors to send in their goals for selling introductory subscriptions to the Militant and Perspectiva Mundial and copies of New International by Friday, September 15, at noon E.S.T. Reports on sales so far, plans for the subscription drive, and photographs of sales teams in action are also needed, so they can be shared with others through the pages of the Militant.