While the drive fell slightly short in all three categories--reaching 94 percent of the 1,100 Militant subscription goal, 415 out of 500 PM subs, and 609 out of 800 New Internationals, a number of important gains were made in reaching out to working people and youth during the 10-week campaign.

We would like to welcome all of our new readers, encourage you to contribute letters and articles to the paper, and introduce friends and co-workers to the socialist press. We hope you use the papers to get more involved in building support for the free speech fight of Mike Italie, organize solidarity with strikes and other struggles, find out about Militant Labor Forums and other political activities to attend, and learn about the Young Socialists, Socialist Workers Party, and Communist Leagues.

And we encourage distributors in every area to follow up with everyone who purchased a subscription to make sure they are receiving the paper.

Some of the highlights of the final push in the drive included a report from Joe Swanson in Des Moines, Iowa. "We sold two more Militant subscriptions to students at Grinnell College this week following the two we sold there last week. A few students expressed interest in the Michael Italie fight against political firings and one of the subscribers said if Italie does a tour in the Midwest he would like to help organize a meeting for him."

In Chicago, participants in the sales campaign said they met two young Latinas at a Latino book fair who bought a Militant subscription and the pamphlet, Joining the Young Socialists. They came to a special fund-raising event for the Pathfinder Fund and signed up to participate in the December 15–16 volunteer work weekend in New York.

"As the sales drive headed toward the last day we organized a special effort to make our goal, calling up workers and youth who earlier expressed interest in signing up for the Militant," said meat packer Joel Britton. "We sold Militant subscriptions to a student at DePaul University, a meat packer who was a subscriber to PM, and to several others in a flurry of phone calls."

"We sold two more Militant subscriptions and four PM subscriptions this past week, including four at an apartment complex in the workers' district where the Pathfinder bookstore is located," wrote Jacquie Henderson from Houston. "One worker who lived there was interested in the topic of the latest Militant Labor Forum--the background to the collapse of the giant Enron corporation that has laid off 4,200 workers in Houston this past week. She and hundreds of others were laid off from one of the big hospitals here after their wages were slashed from $10 an hour to $6.50."

Another new PM reader, a meat packer in Houston, bought a subscription after reading an issue. "He decided to subscribe because he liked the coverage on the capitalist crisis in Argentina, the country he comes from," said sales drive participant Lea Sherman, who works with him.

Henderson reported they sold another PM subscription after having a discussion about the paper at the door of a worker's home that was followed up a few days later by a meeting at the state employment office.

Militant campaigners in Minnesota said they made a final push to reach out to radicalizing youth on college campuses and to their co-workers. "Our last subscription was sold at the packinghouse," wrote Tom Fiske. "One campus that we had not yet visited was St. Cloud State, about 60 miles northwest of Twin Cities. The campus was the site of some demonstrations and protest meetings last year against racism. Four students had participated in the Cuba/U.S. Youth Exchange from the college. We sent out a team two weeks ago and spoke to some leaders of student groups and some faculty. A leader of the group on cultural diversity bought a Militant subscription."

Fiske said they set up a literature table during a well-attended meeting on the U.S. sanctions against Iraq this past week where they sold three Militant subscriptions. A local grouping called the Antiwar Committee, which sponsors pacifist marches that attract a number of youth, sponsored a conference December 1 at the University of Minnesota. "We had another literature table where we sold $78 worth of Pathfinder literature and four Militant subscriptions," wrote Fiske, "including one to a Somali college student and one to a high school student.

"Two participants in the sales campaign took a day off work and set up a table all day at the University of Minnesota in Twin Cities last Wednesday and sold an additional subscription," Fiske added. "The table was a lightning rod for discussions on Israel's aggression against the Palestinians."

Socialist workers in Pittsburgh went over their PM goal after selling all six PM subscriptions to poultry workers in the Mifflin, Pennsylvania, area. "The new PM subscribers came from Chile, Honduras, and Puerto Rico," wrote Chris Remple, a garment worker. "People responded to the PM's coverage of the imperialist war against Afghanistan and the working-class resistance to the growing capitalist economic crisis."

Another garment worker in Pittsburgh, Kathie Fitzgerald, said she sold a Militant subscription to a co-worker after going through weeks of discussion about the anthrax scare promoted in the big-business media. "She kept asking me if I was scared and I kept saying no. Then one day she told me, 'I think this anthrax stuff is all a hoax' and bought a subscription to the Militant."

In New York's Garment District a young garment worker originally from Nicaragua stopped by a table set up by a plant-gate team and purchased a single copy of Perspectiva Mundial, promising to meet a regular street table a block away to get a subscription. When he picked up his sub he asked to meet later to purchase several Pathfinder titles and copies of New International magazine.

One highlight of the subscription drive is the consistently larger number of single copies of the Militant sold each week in many cities. Socialist workers and young socialists can build on all these accomplishments in the coming months. There is clearly a desire among workers and youth for a working-class paper that tells the truth. Continuing weekly street tables, plant-gate teams, and sales on the job and at political events will help fill that need.  
 
 
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