On this date in 1744, Skinnar Per Andersson was beheaded in Stockholm — a cautionary examplar of the limits of electoral change. Andersson, (English Wikipedia entry | Swedish) a farmer from Dalarna, was his constituency’s most eloquent exponent of grievances against the ruling Hat party. The latter had proven deeply unresponsive to the complaints of farmers and peasants while also harrowing the countryside for recruits to die in the Hats’ insane war of choice against Russia. Andersson tore into the war policy at a public meeting in July of 1742, demanding punishment for the politicians who had launched it; he...
