Day Three started out like the previous two days of the 34-mile march to Miami, with blue skies and a strong Florida sun beaming down from above. Here, marchers take advantage of the lead flatbed to rest some tired feet.

The CIW contingent was going strong, including Julia Gabriel (white bandana), one of the three RFK Human Rights Award laureates who participated in the march before heading to DC for the award ceremony on the 20th.

Of course, the march brought people together from across the country, including members of the United Workers Association, an organization of labor pool workers from Baltimore, Md...

... and this member of the Family Farm Defenders' "Mad Cow Bloc" from Madison, WI... who, here engaged in a serious strategic discussion on free trade, was udderly disgusted with the impact of neoliberal policies on family farmers both here in the US and throughout the hemisphere...

Energy was high as we started out on the final day, including that of Reverend Marta Burke with the Fulford United Methodist Church (in the blue t-shirt), who generously allowed hundreds of marchers to sleep on the grounds of her church the night before, then showed solidarity above and beyond the call of duty, joining us on the road!

Energy levels subsided as the day wore on, of course, but not the marchers commitment, which never flagged over the 34 mile route.

And keeping marchers' spirits high and positive were the members of the march animation crew, who DJ'ed, chanted...

... and sang non-stop for three days, not letting anyone take their eyes off the prize of getting to Miami and making our voices heard as communities that live the most direct impacts of corporate-led globalization on a daily basis.

A shout of much respect and gratitude goes out to the members of POWER from San Francisco and the Miami Workers Center, who kept us all moving forward during those three long, hot days.

Our leafleters also worked non-stop during the march, making sure bystanders heard and understood our message (our other leafleters, not pictured here, were a little better at the dialogue part of the job...) ...

... a message that was received with an incredible wave of smiles, honks, and thumbs up all along the route, even several stories above the street where our leafleters couldn't reach...

... well, alright, there were some -- very few -- Miami natives who didn't seem to take so kindly to the march, like this one here who wore this rather grim, unchanging expression as the marchers filed by... (a real iguana, by the way, sitting in trees along the march route!)...

But most were like this man, who graciously made his feelings known with his own little sign.

The press was everywhere, and impressed with the level of organization in the march. While media coverage in the days leading up to the march focused on possible clashes with the police, the press actually had to cover the issues -- working class people's issues -- during the three days of the Root Cause march. Here Lucas Benitez of the CIW talks with the Spanish-language television channel Univision...

While Francisca Cortez of the CIW talks with another reporter as the march stopped outside of the INS office on Biscayne Blvd.

The march made three stops on the final day, before ending up in front of the fence surrounding the economic ministers in downtown Miami. Here, at the first stop in front of Miami's INS offices, marchers draw the connection between immigration issues and free trade policies, which displace poor rural people throughout the Americas from the land they have worked for generations and force them into a desperate migration in search of a way to feed their families in the new global economy, where corporate agriculture rules the market.

Marlene Bastien, of FANM (Haitian Women of Miami) makes the point forcefully, calling for the release of all Haitian immigrants detained in violation of their human rights by INS authorities.

Then, as the march continued to grow throughout the day, it was on to Taco Bell...

... where marchers took the CIW's message of "not just fast, but FAIR, food" to this Biscayne Blvd. restaurant, which was very, very well guarded by hundreds of police (who, by some miracle, are not in this picture)...

Gerardo Reyes and Francisca Cortez of the CIW led the chants outside Taco Bell...

... their message artfully echoed by this sign, prepared and carried by some fine people from California who joined the march on the final day, complete with some eye-catching tomato costumes (which you can just barely see on the left of the photo and behind the woman holding up the sign on the right)...

... and echoed further down the now quite long line of marchers by two old CIW friends who traveled to the march from North Carolina!

... and echoed, once again, in this simple sign, reminding the world that there is no food without the people who break their backs working every day to get it from the field to your table, yet don't earn enough themselves to adequately feed their own children.

The march moved on from Taco Bell down Biscayne...

... and continued to grow as it did, arriving at its final stop before the fence in downtown Miami, here at the Miami Dade School Board building...

... where Denise Perry of Miami's Power U led the call to fight the privatization of our schools and to return schools to community control so that all of our children may have access to the highest quality education possible.

From the School Board, there was only one stop left -- at the fences in Miami's downtown that the police had erected to keep the FTAA ministerial meetings private, secret, and free of participation by the very people whose lives were at stake in the negotiations over the FTAA.

By the time we reached the fences, the march had swelled to well over 1,000 people. The police still out-numbered us, though, as nearly 3,000 police surrounded the march, fully ready to attack those gathered in protest with a complete arsenal of weapons (from rubber bullets to tazers), as they would two days later in a totally outrageous attack on marchers' human and civil rights during actions on Thursday, Nov. 20th.

Fortunately for all those involved, no such thing ever had a chance to develop, as the same discipline and respect that marked the first 33 miles of the march carried us through the final mile, as well. So -- after leaving the fences intact, and more than a few faux anarchists sadly disappointed -- the marchers wrapped up a wholly successful three days of struggle with a rally/concert in Miami's Bayfront Park, with the able MC'ing of none other than Jaribu Hill of the Mississippi Workers Center (above), who, as always, kept the program tight throughout the four-hour show.

... candles that conveniently doubled as lighters during the second half of the night's music program!

... and JG & Havikenhayes out of Ft. Lauderdale (though to us it seems like they're just straight out of Immokalee!). Both bands rocked the rally and raised the marchers' spirits even higher, which was no easy task after three such intense days as those we had just lived in the Root Cause People's March.

Again, our thanks go out to all that participated and made the march possible. Special thanks -- no, thanks is not the word, really, more like just a huge shout out -- to our compañeros at the Miami Workers Center and Power U, the other two thirds of Root Cause and ideal partners in this collaboration in struggle that is sure to continue to grow and gain power in the months and years ahead!

"Root, Root Cause, Root Root, Root Cause!..."