Mostly we know the story. A Roman Catholic, part of a despised and persecuted religious minority in England in 1605, was involved in The Gunpowder Plot. This operation was supposed to kill the House of Lords and King James I (of England, VI of Scotland) to make way for a Catholic monarch to take power and end the tyranny of the Stuarts and the nobility. Someone ratted the coup out, and on the night of 5 November, Fawkes and 36 barrels of gunpowder in the basement below the assembly room. After torture, he confessed and was executed. He was supposed to be hung, drawn, and quarters, but he broke his neck falling from the gallows.
He was not a republican (that form of English rebel came 40 years later) nor was he a democrat: he believed in monarchy, in accordance with the teaching of Rome at the time. Today, thanks to changing perceptions, movies like V for Vendetta and its use of Guy Fawkes masks (to be copied in hundreds of protests, especially in Anglophile regions), he is seen as a symbol of resistance against government tyranny.
His story, his perceived example, is an important part of British history, especially given the behavior of both monarchs and Parliament (not just Lords but Commons) in the last four+ centuries: the more forceful tyranny of Charles I, the English Civil War and rule by Parliament under the Protectorate, and on down to the present.
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The Price of Liberty 
Civil war ahead in these States?
In October, MSN presented a “thought piece” on line, “Is the US headed for another Civil War?” As is often the case with such stories, the analysis is shallow, filled with the written equivalent of talking heads, and of course starting with a recent Hollywood movie and quickly moving to compare the current and future state of affairs here in the States to the often mis-labeled American Civil War of 1861-65.
As is common, the article made various claims about what is and what not healthy in American politics, and what system(s) of government we have. One talking head spoke of how we are all part of a single political unit. He then pontificated about how “a fundamental piece of a democracy” is settling disputes non-violently.
Oddly, history shows this claim to be wrong. Even limited forms of democracy have time and again been characterized by intense violence and even greater promises and promotion of violently resolving disputes. Does democracy have a “fundamental piece?” Well, a “fundamental principle?” One source claims it is “popular sovereignty.” This is the idea that the authority of the government is derived from the consent of the governed.
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