Vol. 76/No. 17      April 30, 2012

The current drive is part of a long-term effort by members of the communist movement to increase the readership of the paper among the broadest layers of working people. A consistent weekly aspect of the effort is door-to-door sales in working-class neighborhoods. Campaigners will also regularly take part in picket lines and other labor resistance; join protests against cop brutality; and get out to rural towns, mining areas and other places outside cities where branches are organized.

Last weekend, reports Laura Anderson from Chicago, four members of the Socialist Workers Party “were well received in southern Illinois coal mining communities. Nearly everyone we spoke with welcomed the Militant coverage on the fight to jail Trayvon Martin’s killer.”

Over two days, the socialist workers sold nine subscriptions, four revolutionary books and 23 single copies of the paper. This includes 16 copies at the American Coal Co. mine portal, as well as eight subscriptions and several single copies of the paper in the coal mining communities of Galatia and Benton. Going door to door they engaged in a wide range of discussions, including the fight for safety in the mines; how to resist the capitalists’ assault on our livelihoods, unions and rights; cop harassment and racist discrimination.

At a Saturday evening barbecue in Paducah, Ky., Militant supporters joined three members of the United Steelworkers union who were part of a 14-monthlong union battle after being locked out by Honeywell at its nuclear processing plant in Metropolis, Ill. The three are long-term readers of the Militant.

“Over dinner,” writes Anderson, “we had a lively discussion on their continuing fight to strengthen their union against harassment and firings by the company.” Then socialist worker Betsy Farley gave a brief presentation on her trip to Cuba as part of a Militant reporting team that covered the Havana International Book Fair in February. This opened a discussion about the Cuban Revolution.

One Steelworker renewed his subscription to the paper. Two copies each were sold of Malcolm X, Black Liberation, and the Road to Workers Power by Jack Barnes and Women in Cuba: The Making of a Revolution Within the Revolution by Cuban leaders Vilma Espín, Asela de los Santos and Yolanda Ferrer.

Malcolm X, Black Liberation, and the Road to Workers Power and The Working Class and the Transformation of Learning, also by Barnes, are both offered at reduced prices with a subscription. (See front page.)

“I just came back from a plant gate sale at the Van Houtte coffee plant,” writes John Steele from Montreal. “A worker who has bought the Militant a number of times subscribed today while going in to work.”

Two subscriptions were sold last Saturday going door to door in Valleyfield, an industrial town west of Montreal. One was to a millwright who works at General Dynamics, the other to a high school student who participated in a large demonstration last month against the Quebec government’s decision to raise tuition fees.

In his letter below, long-time reader Horace Kerr from Denver requests that his weekly Militant bundle be increased and adopts a goal in the subscription campaign. We urge you to follow his example. Adopt a goal for the subscription drive. Join the effort to increase the readership of the socialist newsweekly. Contact a distributor listed on page 8 or call the Militant office (see page 2).
 
 
Related articles:
‘Accordingly, Denver will take goal in drive’
NY meeting boosts ‘Militant’ subscription, fund efforts
Spring Subscription Drive April 14-June 10 Goal: 2,400 (chart)  
 
 
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