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46 The Paper and a New Society Since time immemorial man has fought for certain rights, one of the main ones being the right to freedom of speech. Correspondence feels that in this issue that right has been somewhat curtailed. This issue we have only eight pages.* Thirteen months ago and twenty-eight issues back seventy-five people decided to publish a twelve-page paper. We had a conception drawn from experience and history that the common people needed a paper where they could say what they thought about their government, the way it should be run, what they thought about their jobs and homes, every aspect of their lives. Never in history has there been such a paper. There have been labor papers, but man’s life is more than labor. It is a full life. It takes in the totality of a human being. This cut means to us that somehow, although we seventy-five contributed over $750 a month and went out and met over a thousand people and got subs from them, somehow we haven’t got across to these people what the paper means to us and what it means to them. This paper in a sense is our whole life and purpose. People who never thought that what they said meant anything are saying it. It’s being read by thousands of others. We who put out the paper have gained strength. Those we have met have gained strength. They found out that what they felt and thought mattered . Basis for a New Society If what Correspondence has published could be put into action, it would be the basis of establishing a new society, a society based on what the majority feels. What our readers think would mean the best society that ever was. No society has ever existed before that the bulk of the people have run. Society has always been ruled by the other folks. If this paper could get the active support of its readers it could get to be a daily. A daily wouldn’t just be what poor folks say about society. It would force society to change to what they think it should be. Your Strength Is Needed Most of our subscribers are convinced, to one degree or another, that there is a need for such a paper. But we haven’t met enough of them and the seventy-five of us can’t ever do it. So the only way it can be done is if you, one of our thousand subscribers, *The paper had just completed its first year and was struggling to raise its level of support, both financially and in terms of readers participating in the production of the paper. —Ed. Ward.indb 46 12/21/10 9:27 AM The Paper and a New Society 47 begin to take the steps of coming to meet us at our editing meetings and at our parties, sending Correspondence to your friends, shop mates, and neighbors in your community , sending in your own dimes, quarters, dollars, and subscriptions and asking your friends to send in theirs. The strength and roots to spread the paper is in you readers. You are in a thousand neighborhoods and have thousands of friends and shop mates that we seventy-five will never be able to reach. On Your Terms It isn’t a question of “Have we done enough?” We have done as much as our small number will allow us to do. Now, whether we continue is a decision that the readers have to make, based on whether they want a new society on the terms they think it should be, not on the other man’s terms. Because that is what Correspondence stands for. A new society on the ordinary people’s terms. We are urging everyone, subscriber, contributor, and supporter, to write in, even those who disagree, what they think about this paper and how we can solve this financial problem. We hope that, along with their criticism, they will send a donation, so that even those who disagree will continue to have a place to say what they think in this period where the right to say what one thinks and feels is threatened more than ever before. [ October 30, 1954 ] Ward.indb 47 12/21/10 9:27 AM ...

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