Manager’s Column

From Fourth International, April 1946, Vol.7 No.4, p.98.
Transcribed, edited & formatted by Ted Crawford & David Walters in 2008 for ETOL.

April 1 is the opening date of Fourth International’s subscription campaign for 500 new subscribers. For sometime, many of our agents have felt that Fourth International should be introduced to a wider circle of readers. Recent events have heightened the interest and increased the need for theoretical political understanding. Thousands of leading trade unionists are realizing the importance for the labor movement to have a rounded social viewpoint and program of action. The experiences of the war and the strike struggles have further strengthened this tendenw. Thousands of veterans are now looking for an explanation of world events and a solution. They can only receive this through the Marxist analysis and program.

During the two-month period of the campaign, we are featuring the rate of $1.00for a 6-month subscription. The following quotas have been assigned for each of the large cities in which we have an active agent:

Quotas for Fourth International Subscription Campaign

CITY QUOTA
Akron	............	10
Allentown-Bethlehem	............	5
Bayonne	............	10
Boston	............	10
Buffalo	............	20
Chicago	............	40
Cleveland	............	10
Connecticut	............	5
Detroit	............	40
Flint	............	10
Los Angeles	............	60
Milwaukee	............	5
Minneapolis	............	25
Newark	............	20
New York	............	100
Philadelphia	............	20
Pittsburgh	............	5
Reading	............	5
St. Louis	............	5
St.Paul	............	10
San Diego	............	5
San Francisco	............	25
Seattle	............	20
Tacoma	............	5
Toledo	............	10
Youngstown	............	20
Total	............	500

New York has the largest quota of 100 subscriptions. This does not mean that Los Angeles, with a quota of 60, may not challenge New York’s position, especially on a percentage basis. It will be interesting to see what results are obtained in Detroit and Chicago, both great industrial cities, who in this campaign each have a quota of 40.

Likewise, Minneapolis and San Francisco will possibly toss down the gauntlet to each other to see which goes over the top first. Four other cities – Buffalo, Newark, Seattle and Youngstown – are set for Trotskyist competition on quotas of 20 each. Which of these four cities will first attain its goal, and which will chalk up the highest number of subs?

There are a number of cities in which we have active agents who have not been assigned quotas. Portland, Kansas City, Rochester, San Pedro, Cincinnati and Baltimore should be stung into competition by this challenge. The scoreboard will of course, be extended to include any or all of these cities. In fact, nothing would give us more pleasure than to devote a large part of the Manager’s Column in the May issue to an accounting of their achievements in this campaign.

The May issue of Fourth International will contain a report on the number of subscriptions received and the percentage of the total this number constitutes.

It is our belief that the initiative of the agents is one of the most important factors in signing up subscribers. Agents should call the attention of readers to the fact that a subscription is the best way of assuring the prompt arrival of their copy of the magazine. Subscribers will not have to rely on newsstands. We receive many orders for current copies from readers who find the newsstand sold out in their vicinity. Of course, newsstands will continue to carry the FI for those readers who are first getting acquainted with our magazine.

Agents should also point out that with the many discussion groups, lectures and forums which use the articles in the FI for material, it is very helpful for students to have a chance to study the magazine beforehand. Attention should be called to articles in past issues of the magazine which have discussed and analyzed the most burning and pressing issues of our times. T. Cliff’s articles on the Jewish problem, the editors’ analysis of the lessons of the strike wave in the March FI and Scientists and the Atom Bomb in the same issue, are but a few examples of the kind of articles that class conscious workers are looking for.

Onward to a successful campaign!

* * * *

Letters from our subscribers: To a request for information on how he happened to subscribe to Fourth International , T.C., San Francisco, replies:

“What led me to subscribe was Birchman’s informative article on Nigeria.(October 1945 FI) I enjoy the FI

“I do find an error on the first page, however, as follows: February 1946,you say ‘The labor movement in America is 14 million strong ... over one fourth of the whole working-class, as large a trade union movement as any working-class has ever built in relation to the labor population.’

“Australia seems to have us by a good margin. In 1928 its unions had 911,541 (15% of the total population) or over half the wage-earners 60% of the men and 47% of the women. Even in 1936 the unionized figure stood at 814,809.”

From E.M.G. Madison, Ohio:

“You asked me in your first letter to let you know how I liked the article. (The Middle East at the Crossroads, by T. Cliff, December 1945.) It was excellent and all that Dr. Nearing implied. Please have my subscription start with the January issue, as there was a continuation of the article by T. Cliff.”

* * * *

On the foreign scenes we have received a letter from Ceylon, telling us of a new book company which is launching a special advertising campaign to popularize Fourth International and other Trotskyist literature. This company is now receiving a bundle order of 100 copies per month. We wish them success in this undertaking.

H.J., Cape Town, requests a regular bundle order and says:

“Once more we are receiving copies of the FI and the comrades await each issue keenly, particularly after the literature starvation in South Africa which flowed from war censorship.”

Great Britain:

“I received my receipt for Fourth International and was delighted.

“You ask for my impressions of the magazine. As you may know I was a member of the National Administrative Council of the ILP until Easter 1945 when I was expelled for ‘Trotskyism.’ I can tell you that the theoretical articles in the FI were largely responsible for my development away from Centrism to Marxism, together of course with the fundamental Marxist works.”

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Last updated on 9.2.2009