Thoreau and civil disobedience

On the 23rd or 24th of July 1846, Henry David Thoreau was stopped by the Concord (MA) tax collector and asked to pay his poll tax. Thoreau refused, and as a result ended up in jail. He was released the next day, when an anonymous person paid the tax on his behalf, but Thoreau wasn’t thankful at all, he was angry. The episode became a famous (or infamous, depending on whom you ask) example of civil disobedience, and eventually led…