We attended the Hotel Employee and Restaurant Employees Union Local 17 rally June 9. Sales were brisk to hotel workers, Overnite transportation strikers, students, and other unionists. When we regrouped we found we had sold 50 Militants, 10 PM special editions, and a Militant subscription.

One team left the rally early to go to the Dakota Premium plant to talk to meat packers on their lunch break. A worker from the kill line said, "We have no choice, we must organize a union," and bought both the Militant and the PM special edition. Four Militants and seven PM supplements were sold there.

After the rally teams went to a Minneapolis nonunion meatpacking plant and sold 2 Militants and 7 PM supplements. Workers there were excited to see the papers and many of them expressed that they need a union too. At stores in the Latino community in south Minneapolis we sold 10 more Militants and 26 PM special issues. By that point we needed to order more papers.

Saturday morning we picked up new bundles of papers that had just arrived and headed out to working-class communities to get out the word about the Dakota Premium Foods struggle and a rally the workers there had called for Monday afternoon.

One team went to a church that was hosting the Mexican consul, who comes to town once a year to talk with immigrant workers about getting visas and other legal documents. Workers had been in line for hours when we got there so we missed a lot, but we were able to sell 30 PM supplements and a few other papers.

A team went to a trailer park near the Dakota Premium plant and met workers who had worked in the plant previously, some of whom were on medical leave having been injured, all of whom wanted to tell about the horrendous working conditions in the plant. They also told us of other places in the area where meat packers live. Teams again went to the Latino food stores and a team went to the home of one of the Dakota Premium workers to visit with her and a neighbor.

That evening there was an overflow crowd at the Militant Labor Forum at the Pathfinder Bookstore in St. Paul where workers, students, and community activists heard the story of the strike and organizing drive from two of the workers involved in it. When we tallied the sales for the day we had sold 101 PM supplements and 21 Militants.

Sunday was an opportunity for us to go to two churches that have been involved in immigrant rights activities. Announcements were made at both about the union rally the next day, and along with other activists we handed out flyers for it. Sales there totaled 15 Militants and 44 PM supplements.  
 

The experience in selling the Militant and Perspectiva Mundial in Minnesota was similar in other areas. The unity among workers in resisting the bosses attempts to squeeze more blood money out of them and forcing concessions from the company through their fight is inspiring for other workers facing similar conditions. Edwin Fruit in Des Moines said one of his co-workers at the IBP plant in Perry, Iowa, where he works remarked, "We have to give support to these workers because when we are in a fight we will need them to support us."

"Last Saturday we set up a campaign table outside a Mexican store in Des Moines where we sold 25 PM supplements," said Fruit, who is a Socialist Workers candidate for U.S. Congress. "Several of those who bought the issue were co-workers at IBP. One of them said the company has instituted a policy that makes it harder for immigrant workers to keep their benefits and seniority. He said, 'we are going to our union meeting to protest this.'"

Fruit said they sold three copies of the Militant to strikers on the picket line at Titan Tire, 7 PM supplements and two copies of the paper to workers at Iowa Pack, a nonunion packing plant, and 16 PM supplements and two Militants to co-workers at IBP.  
 
Los Angeles immigrant rights action
Sales of the Militant, Perspectiva Mundial, and Pathfinder literature went pretty well at the California immigrant rights forums sponsored by the AFL-CIO, said Mark Friedman. In Fresno the event was attended by 2,500 people, more than double what the organizers expected. "We were invited to set up a table inside," he said. "We set one up outside as well. For two hours we talked to workers, mostly Mexican, sold six PM subscriptions, four copies of Nueva Internacional, and a number of other titles, including books by Che Guevara, a leader of the Cuban revolution."

Friedman said Militant and PM supporters from Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Fresno set up four Pathfinder tables outside the immigrant rights forum at the Sports Arena in Los Angeles. One young woman who came by one of the tables, Nancy Miranda, remarked, "I've never seen this kind of literature or these ideas. They're wonderful." After spending some time reading parts of several different books, she bought a PM subscription and a pamphlet on a woman's right to choose abortion.

By the end of the day they had sold eight PM subs, and one Militant sub. Nearly $500 in literature was also snapped up, including 5 copies of Che Guevara Talks to Young People, 4 copies of Capitalism's World Disorder: Working-Class Politics at the Millennium, 4 copies of the Communist Manifesto, and several issues of Nueva Internacional. The sales team there also sold nearly 100 copies of Perspectiva Mundial and the Militant.

"Please Fedex 20 more copies of issue no. 24 to St. Louis," wrote Ellie García. We are planning to sell the paper at the plant gates of a garment factory, a meat processing plant in the city, and at the Excel meatpacking plant in Columbia, Missouri." She said they plan to visit a farmers organization in the region as well.

"This week we sold six copies of the Militant at the Excel meatpacking plant in Beardstown, Illinois, and 15 papers at a street table near Washington University here in St. Louis." García said they did not have the PM special edition when they went door-to-door in a working-class neighborhood in Beardstown. One Mexican worker, who spoke little English, was so interested in the Dakota Premium meat packers that he decided to purchase the Militant. "We're going to give it a try," he said.

"Tonight we are meeting with two students from Washington University, one of whom is a subscriber, to discuss politics," said García. "They belong to a campus group and they are interested in organizing campaign events for socialist candidates. We had sold Militant subscriptions to three of their members during the subscription drive." Some of those in the group are involved in a union organizing drive at a hospital in the area, she added.

"We had a very successful weekend getting out this issue of the Militant," wrote Ardy Blandford, a member of the United Auto Workers union in Birmingham, Alabama. "I sold four copies of the Militant to my co-workers at our union meeting. Co-workers were very inspired that workers at a nonunion plant were willing to risk getting fired in order to fight for their demands."

Blandford reported that two sales teams were dispatched; one to a Pittsburg and Midway mine where one team sold five papers and to Gulf States Steel where a team sold l5 current papers and eight of the previous week's issue. "We also had a team go to Natchez, Mississippi, where they met with Titan Tire strikers on the picket line." One striker renewed his Militant subscription  
 

In response to the labor battles erupting in Minnesota, longtime supporters of the socialist movement there are pitching in on several key fronts that have made a difference.

The photos of the June 12 march in St. Paul by meat packers fighting for a union, on the front page and elsewhere in this issue, were made possible by Michael Pennock, who loaned his digital camera to Militant worker-correspondents for the duration. Pennock has also made spare rooms in his house available for workers arriving from out of town to be part of building solidarity with these labor fights, and Young Socialists taking part in the socialist summer school.

Another supporter of the Socialist Workers Party contributed a dozen travel vouchers, which will be a big help for socialist workers and youth to respond quickly to these class-struggle events.  
 
 
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