Those researching the history of political democracy in Scotland will inevitably find that one name stands out from the crowd, namely that of Thomas Muir of Huntershill (1765-1799). He was one of several people tried in Scottish courts during the 1790s for the alleged crime of 'Sedition', and four of the others (Thomas Fyshe Palmer, William Skirving, Maurice Margarot and Joseph Gerrald) share commemoration with him on a large monument in Edinburgh; but somehow Muir seems special. The way he used his trial as a platform to promote the logic of 'an equal representation of the People in the...