"Workers at Verizon know the reality of the 'miracle economy,' " Harris said. "Company profits and expansion have come from intensification of labor, lengthening the workweek, and a drive to dilute and ultimately get rid of the union itself. These strikers are standing up against the assaults by the industrial giants in the United States, joining the resistance being waged by coal miners, meat packers, aluminum and tire workers, and others."

The socialist candidate called on the government to end court-imposed restrictions on picketing and condemned the portrayal of the strikers as violence-prone by the big-business media.

In a three-day swing here, Harris also met with workers on strike against Marriott hotels and Domino Sugar in Brooklyn. Some 300 members of Local 1814 of the International Longshoremen's Association (ILA) have been striking Domino Sugar since June 15, 1999, when they walked off the job after working without a contract for nine months. Joe Crimi, vice president of Local 1814, and a dozen other workers filled in Harris and Socialist Workers senatorial candidate Jacob Perasso on the latest developments in the strike and described the solidarity they are receiving from other unions in New York.

Harris is a member of the Union of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile Employees, on leave from his job in Atlanta at a large garment distribution center of the Marshalls retail chain. His tour coincided with the drive to collect 30,000 signatures to place the Socialist Workers candidates on the ballot in New York.

So far 26,387 have been collected. During his visit he also took part in a discussion session over dinner hosted by the Young Socialists, was interviewed by WBAI radio, and spoke at a citywide campaign meeting.

At the campaign rally, Harris reported that one of the pickets had asked him if he has spoken on college campuses, adding, "I hope you do, because we need educated young people who understand what you're talking about to help lead us." Harris noted that his campaign is always on the lookout for opportunities to speak on campuses, but he had explained that "the hardest thinking, the most sophisticated thinking, about what we face and what to do about it is occurring on that picket line and on others like it around the country. It is from struggles such as those at Domino Sugar, Verizon, and elsewhere that we will forge a leadership of the working class and fight to transform the unions into revolutionary instruments of struggle."

Under capitalism, Harris explained, workers are taught to see themselves not as actors, as the subjects of history, but as its objects. Workers, he said, "hope that the educational system will provide some solution to their problems. We are offered a voucher program, a magnet school, or some other scheme that will supposedly mean a better life for us or our children. But there are no individual solutions to the social problems we face.

"Our campaign brings the history and lessons of working-class struggle to fighters today, such as those on the picket line at Domino Sugar, so we can begin to build the kind of revolutionary leadership that can resolve the social crisis we face. That's what all these books are about!" Harris concluded, pointing towards the large display of revolutionary literature at the back of the room.

Carlos, an immigrant worker from Suriname and a veteran of union battles in that country, was attending his first socialist campaign event. He said in an interview that he agreed with what Harris had to say. He first met campaign supporters who were collecting signatures for ballot status. "Someone said something about opposing police brutality and the death penalty. That seemed like a good idea, so I signed the petition. Then I got a copy of the newspaper [the Militant]. I couldn't buy a book because I only had $20 left for my food. But I read the paper at the bus stop and went back to the table and bought Capitalism's World Disorder. That's why I'm here tonight!"

Jacob Perasso, Socialist Workers candidate for U.S. Senate in New York, contributed to this article.