Vol. 76/No. 36      October 8, 2012

This perspective is based on recognition—tested and confirmed over the last couple years—of a greater interest among working people across the board in a socialist newsweekly that covers working-class struggles around the world, explains the roots and character of the international crisis of capitalism, and presents a revolutionary fighting road forward.

Today two readers ordered small bundles of the paper for the first time. Consider following their example.

Retired seaman Howard Allen in New Orleans ordered a weekly bundle of three. A Socialist Workers elector in this year’s election in Louisiana, Allen first subscribed to the paper when he met Militant worker correspondents outside his home a week after Hurricane Katrina.

Samir Hazboun, a student at Guilford College in Greensboro, N.C., who first subscribed to the paper in January, ordered a bundle of five along with a packet of subscription cards to sell on his campus with other supporters of the Militant from Atlanta next week. “The paper covers workers’ struggles that you don’t hear about elsewhere and is critical of the institutions, which I am also,” he said.

The backbone of this campaign will be door-to-door sales in working-class neighborhoods, in cities big and small as well as rural areas. The goal is to talk with a broad spectrum of working people: Black, Latino, Caucasian and others; U.S.-born and immigrant.

This consistent door-to-door effort will be supplemented by other opportunities to get the paper into the hands of workers, farmers and young people—from picket lines and factory gates to social protest actions against police brutality, for women’s right to choose abortion and other struggles in the interests of the working class.

‘Militant’ circulation director

You may have been reading the Militant for years or weeks. You may have been introduced to the paper in your neighborhood, on the job, on a picket line, in your union hall or campus, or at a Militant Labor Forum or other public political event. Consider joining supporters of the Militant in your area to help introduce the paper to others by contacting the nearest distributor listed on page 8, or me directly at the paper. Help win new readers among friends, relatives and coworkers.

To fellow workers behind bars: find ways to circulate the paper among inmates and tell them about the Militant’s trial offers and special rate for prisoners—$5 for six months. We’ve received growing evidence that readers behind bars not only appreciate the Militant, but want to help spread its message.

We’ve started to receive some reports that show the opportunities to involve more and more people in the campaign.

Tom Baumann from Miami described the response of Lucas Azambuja, a student at Miami-Dade College, when he renewed his subscription. “When we told him that the fall subscription campaign will be drawing on the Militant’s readers to help get it out,” Baumann said, “he said he knew neighborhoods where he thought we could get a good hearing. The next day, despite rain, he and I sold a couple of subscriptions going door to door in the African-American neighborhood of Coconut Grove and South Miami.”

After that, Baumann said, they discussed politics at a bagel shop and Azambuja bought The Working Class and the Transformation of Learning by Jack Barnes and The Cuban Five: Who They Are, Why They Were Framed, How They Will Be Free by Mary-Alice Waters and Martín Koppel, two of four books offered at reduced prices with a subscription to the paper.

From New York, Sara Lobman wrote about selling three subscriptions in the Morrisania neighborhood in the Bronx Sept. 22 where Reynaldo Cuevas, 20, was shot and killed by cops a couple weeks earlier. He was killed after he ran out of the grocery where he works following a robbery there.

“I guess you need the cops,” said Sobeyda Fleti, “but I would never call them. I just don’t trust them.” Fleti was sitting outside the small beauty shop she owns with her friend Angelica González, a retired garment worker. Both are originally from Puerto Rico.

Fleti bought a subscription to the Militant and a copy of The Cuban Five, a collection of articles from the Militant explaining the case of Cuban revolutionaries framed and jailed by Washington and the international campaign to free them.

Fleti then brought Militant supporters down the street to meet Janie Williams, the owner of a hair salon. Williams bought a subscription to the paper to set out in the salon for her customers and took a blank subscription card in case any of them were interested in getting it delivered to their home.

The following day supporters of the paper in New York sold 20 subscriptions and 40 books on revolutionary working-class politics at the Pathfinder Books booth at the outdoor Brooklyn Book Festival.

New and renewal subscriptions are also coming in by mail.

“I like the comparison between the Obama vs. Romney platforms,” Adela Cuaron-Dimitrijevich recently wrote along with a one-year renewal to the paper, which she sent with a contribution to help cover the costs of Militant reporting trips. Cuaron-Dimitrijevich is a nurse from Canyon Country near Los Angeles, working 12-hour shifts, who first subscribed last spring.

Join us now in broadening the circulation of the Militant. Quotas taken by the paper’s supporters in local areas, along with the overall international goal will be listed in a chart to be printed in a coming issue.

If your city’s not on the chart—start selling subscriptions and earn a spot. State University of New York students Harry D’Agostino and Callie Miaoulis restarted their bundle two days ago to maintain the New Paltz spot they’ve held since last fall.

Send your comments, experiences, reports and photos related to the subscription campaign for future coverage. The weekly deadline for each issue is Monday at 9:00 a.m. EST.  
 
 
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