How To Champion Democracy

A community’s heritage is not owned just by powerbrokers and ‘winners’. The fabric of the past is woven by everyone – including those who championed radical changes but were unsuccessful. John Thelwall was one such visionary. He was at various times a published author, democracy campaigner, public orator, political theorist, state prisoner on a charge of high treason, small farmer in mid-Wales, novelist, poet, teacher of elocution and political journalist. He was rarely despondent for long. Nonetheless, his main political quest was unsuccessful. The introduction of manhood suffrage was not achieved in Britain until well after his death. (And votes for women, mooted by a few visionaries in the 1790s, took even longer to realise.)