Happy Australia Day!

Since our loyal kith and kin in the Land of Oz are one day ahead of most of us, I am posting "today".

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'Captain Coward'

Not exactly a piece of pure and exalted manhood. That's a long way down indeed.

The survivor statistics tell the tale. More women from third class — deep in the bowels of the ship, where it was hard to escape and instructions were vague or nonexistent — survived than men from first class. Almost all of the women from first class (97 percent) and second class (84 percent) made it. As Butler notes, the men from first class who were lost stayed behind voluntarily, true to their Edwardian ideals.

They can look faintly ridiculous from our vantage point. Benjamin Guggenheim changed into his evening clothes that night: “We’ve dressed in our best and are prepared to go down like gentlemen.” Whom would you rather have around your wife or daughter, though, when there is only one slot left on the lifeboat? Old Guggenheim in his white tie and tails, or the contemporary slob in his Bermuda shorts and flip-flops?

The Titanic went down, they say, to the strains of the hymn “Nearer, My God, to Thee,” as the band courageously played on. It lent a final grace note to the tragedy. Today, we don’t do grace notes. We’ve gone from “Women and children, first,” to “Dude, where’s my lifeboat?” As the women of the Costa Concordia can testify, that’s a long way down.

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Diamond Jubilee Pageant on the River Thames

The elevated spectacle of a slow moving pageantry on the River Thames celebrating the diamond jubilee of the world's preeminent hereditary monarchy promises to captivate the attention of the largest television audience in history. The Queen's Diamond Jubilee pageant will showcase one thousand ships - the biggest collection of boats in 350 years - each of which will take 90 minutes to pass any one spot. Applications from across the Commonwealth were three time overscribed. A million waving and cheering people are expected to line the Thames.

The mustering of boats will cover 30 miles, the procession beginning at Hammersmith and ending at the Tower Bridge. The largest boat will be the 68-metre Royal Barge; the smallest a kayak. Every realm of the Crown Commonwealth will be represented. There will be American whaling boats, a slipper launch from Canada and surfer boats from every state of Australia. Boats will include Amazon used in Victoria's Diamond Jubilee and a motor boat used by Churchill and Eisenhower to review the Anglo-Canadian-American D-Day Allied Forces.

This wonderful river pageantry is the brainchild of HRH Prince Charles, who will fittingly serve as patron of the event. Lord Salisbury, whose great grandfather was Prime Minister of Great Britain during Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee in 1897, is appropriately chairing the organization overlooking it. Incredibly no public funds will be spent - all of it corporate sponsors or private donations from the public.

Perhaps the daftest thing sofar offered on this comes from London's Mayor, Boris Johnson, who opined that it would be an "anticipatory drum roll" for the Olympics, as if our Diamond Queen is merely playing "warm up" for this year's international summer athletes. Good morning, Boris! You may leave your dunce cap at the door.

Very well then - there is only one remaining unanswered question concerning the greatest assemblage of boats in more than three centuries: Which canoe will the republicans be protesting on?

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Not So Quaint

A Canadian institution:

Appreciating that the Crown is our concept of the state helps us resolve the most contentious issue in the burgeoning monarchy-republic debate: whether the institution is Canadian or British. Historically, Canada and the United Kingdom shared the same Crown. With the enactment of the Statute of Westminster in 1931, however, the Canadian and British Crowns became two distinct institutions, reflecting Canada's evolution from a self-governing colony to an independent state.

Where does the person of the sovereign fit in all this? The Queen embodies the Crown; she is essentially the holder of the Crown as an office. For this reason, the sovereign is both the Queen of Canada and Queen of the United Kingdom. Although they are separate and distinct, she holds both offices and embodies both Crowns.

I've never been entirely convinced of the wisdom of emphasizing the Canadian nature of the Crown. There is no getting around the fact that the Queen resides in Britain most of the year. Instead I think we should be comfortable with the "British" aspects of the Crown. Most of Canada's key institutions are British derived, though it is nation peopled by members of every race and creed. We should not shy away from our British heritage. It shows to new Canadians that we are an old country after all, that our values and traditions have stood well history's test.

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Uneasy lies the Jamaican head...

Uneasy lies the head that wears a Crown. - William Shakespeare

For those unaware, Jamaica will be celebrating 50 years of national independence this August 2012. Their prime minister, Mrs. Portia Simpson Miller, is planning to herald this august achievement by ditching their diamond Queen and by reintroducing the death penalty to its country's citizens. As David Flint over at ACM has noted, all we know for certain is that some unspecified form of politician's republic will come with the gallows. Happy birthday, Jamaica!

Quite frankly I am aghast that one political party can use its temporary mandate to overturn the monarchy forever. Speaking as an irredeemable medievalist, I do not believe that one generation has the democratic right to overturn the cumulative work of generations that preceded it, but at the very minimum I would have thought that the people would need to be consulted in a referendum on a clear question on so fundamental an issue as this. This is particularly worrisome if in fact 62% of its population truly supports the institution. Just who and where are these friends of the Jamaican Crown, and why are they not better organized?

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"A very British Canada"

Who killed Canadian history? One can only imagine what Jack Granatstein would think or write about this little corner of the web, if he ever saw it. We are (gasp!) "a very British blog".

I've had my own regrettable exchange with the man (something about the present catching up to me, and the future leaving me in the dust), who congratulated me (accused me) for my role in returning Canada to colonial status. The temptation is to do as he has done and lash out, but two people wrestling in the mud only gets both dirty. Better to keep calm and carry on (egad, there's that Britishness again).

It is strange thing though for a reputable historian to be ashamed of his country's inheritance, who adamantly wants to sever all identifiable links and ties with the past. He's an odd fish: a pro-military Liberal republican who will chastize anyone for holding anti-American views, but who himself is anti-British to his very core. He would probably deny this, but why else can he not fathom the thought that our britishness (small b) is inextricably part of our national identity. He finds it 'appalling' and 'abjectly colonial'.

Make no mistake, what is really going on is a simple return to normal. After forty years of pretending we were not a monarchy (successive governments have done their best to diminish and belittle it), we have a prime minister who is actually (shock!) loyal to Canada's heritage and traditions and is deliberately turning the clock back to its proper time. He is making the country into "a very unLiberal Canada" for the obvious reason that a nation's heritage should not be owned by any one particular political party, and the 8.1 percent who agree with Jack are having an extremely difficult time of it. The present has finally caught up to them, so to speak, and their political future is very bleak indeed.

The last word goes to a commenter,

If, after waking in the morning, Mr. Granatstein isn't embarassed by this petulant rubbish, then his family ought to be deeply concerned for him. Jeffrey Simpson who wrote a similarly contemptuous piece last year should sue him for plagiarism.

Pierre Trudeau entrenched the monarchy in the Constitution Act, 1982 as part of a deal to get his precious 'Charter of Rights and Freedoms'. After three decades of Liberal governments pretending that it was abolished, the current government is re-introducing Canada as it actually is with an ancient Crown covered in maples.

The only thing leaking in Mr. Granatstein's fantasy is his once-admired reputation.

Jack Granatstein: Winning the award for "the lowest overall tone".

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The Grand Old Duke

Old sailors...

As the Queen’s consort, Philip has been constantly at her side throughout her 60 year reign. And while we’re quick to jump on his reported inappropriate comments — which often turn out to be exaggerated stories — he rarely gets the praise he deserves for his tireless devotion to her, to the Commonwealth and to Canada.

In a review of the fleet in Halifax last year, he proudly wore the uniform of an Admiral in the Canadian Navy. He paused and chatted to naval vets. Like him, they served in dangerous waters in wartime, protecting convoys.

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Jean Chretien is joined by John Howard in the Order of Merit



The 2012 New Years Honours List from the Palace brings news that former Australian prime minister, John Howard, has been made a member of the Order of Merit by the Queen.

General information on the OM can easily be found on the web and so will not be canvassed here, but the appointment of Mr Howard to the Order deserves further consideration.

In Australia, there is a tradition of senior honours being bestowed on those that have reached the apex of  public life. Since the office has been "localised", three governors-general (two of whom also served as foreign minister) have been made made Knights of the Garter.  Sir Robert Menzies, Australia's longest serving Prime Minister, was made a Knight of the Thistle in 1963.  Sir Owen Dixon, regarded as Australia's greatest jurist, was made OM, also in 1963.

No Australian has received a knighthood on an official Australian list since 1990.  The last knighthoods from the Royal Prerogative to be bestowed on Australian residents were the KCVO on Sir David Smith in 1992, and the Garter on Sir Ninian Stephen in 1994.  It seems that Australia and Canada both now share the Order of Merit as the most senior honour in public life.

Now, John Howard has joined this exclusive group by being made OM - only the second Australian involved in statecraft ever to be so.  It is not necessarily an endorsement of his policies, but it is a statement by her that she considers him a first-rank political figure.  Given her sixty years on the throne, she has met more successful political figures than anyone else on the planet.  Howard's OM is high praise indeed.

The sad fact of course is that no former Labor politicians have been so recognised, although there have been worthy candidates.  This is less to do with the Queen, than the Australian Labor Party's strict, unyielding position on the honours system and its support for a republic occasionally turning very nasty and personal.  For example, Jack Egerton, a Labor stalwarrt from Queensland was expelled from Labor in the 1970s for accepting a knighthood.  Paul Keating's views are also well known on the matter of a republic.

Pleasingly however, the Prime Minister, Julia Gillard has congratulated Mr Howard on his appointment.

Former Labor prime minister Bob Hawke would be a worthy recipient of the OM (uniquely, he held the AC before entering parliament).  But it is not unreasonable for the Queen to avoid giving such prestigious, intimate honours to people who have publicly and repeatedly said that they disapprove of her office.

For so long as Australia is a constitutional monarchy, and the Australian Labor Party obliges its members and leaders to promote its republican platform regardless of what they may think of it privately, it will forever be diminished and absent from the highest reaches of public life.  This is not an argument for changing the Constitution - after all, like its competitors, Labor is a mere political party, not a constitutional institution.  The Constitution should never be changed for the convenience of a particular political party.

This situation will only change if  Labor senses it no longer needs to invest emotionally in a republic, either by its members or its leaders.  Time will tell.

In the meantime, congratulations to the Hon. John Howard, OM AC SSI.

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What Century?

The wise Young Liberals of Canada are looking for boldness and relevancy in the 21st century, and what better way to bring forth their brave new vision of the country than to ditch the monarchy. Gotta admire the neat rationality of it all, to say nothing of their diamond timing:

WHEREAS Canada is a multicultural nation, built by people from many diverse backgrounds and where at present no Canadian citizen can ever aspire to be head of state of our own country;

WHEREAS Canadians believe in earning one’s position in life and not being simply born into privilege;

WHEREAS our head of state should be a true representative of the People of Canada;

WHEREAS Canada prides itself in being a democratic nation, with democratic institutions;

WHEREAS foreign law bars individuals not of the Anglican faith from rising to the position of head of state of Canada;

WHEREAS Canada’s head of state should conform to Canadian laws of gender and religious equality represented in the Charter of Rights and Freedom;

WHEREAS Canadians pay more to maintain the monarchy than the British;

WHEREAS an unelected individual can and is prepared to supersede the will of the Parliament;

BE IT RESLOVED [sic] that the Liberal Party of Canada, urge the Parliament of Canada to form an all party committee to study the implementation of instituting a Canadian head of state popularly elected and sever formal ties with the British Crown.

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Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936)

Defender of the Empire and Civilization

Unofficial Poet Laureate of the English Speaking Peoples

Youngest Nobel Laureate for Literature

Born December 30th, 1865 - Died January 18th, 1936

A medley of Kipling related material from this blog and elsewhere...

The Complete Poems

Wikipedia Biography

"Not this Tide"

Rudyard Kipling

141 Years Old and Still Looking Good

Kipling and the Iron Ring

Kipling's Game

Kipling's Empire

Kipling's Business

Kipling the Propagandist

Kipling the Globetrotter

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The Christmas Broadcast – 2011

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The Christmas Broadcast - 1957

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Christmas and the Great War

Merry Christmas to all!

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Messiah

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John Edmond: Christmas in Rhodesia

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The Viscount Bolingbroke

260 years ago today (December 12 in the old calendar), Henry St John, 1^st Viscount Bolingbroke passed on.

Alexis Simon Belle: Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke

Lord Bolingbroke wrote The Idea of a Patriot King, in which – amongst other things – he wrote:

Among many reasons which determine me to prefer monarchy to every form of government, this is a principal one. When monarchy is the essential form, it may be more easily and more usefully tempered with aristocracy, or democracy, or both, than either of them, when they are the essential forms, can be tempered with monarchy. It seems to me, that the introduction of a real permanent monarchical power, or any thing more than the pageantry of it, into either of these, must destroy them and extinguish them, as a greater light extinguishes a less. Whereas it may easily be shown, and the true form of our government will demonstrate, without seeking any other example, that very considerable aristocratical and democratical powers may be granted on a monarchical stock, without diminishing the lustre, or restraining the power and authority of the prince, enough to alter in any degree the essential form.

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The Coronation Portrait of Edward VIII

King Edward VIII like we've never seen him before. Had he not abdicated, everything else staying the same, Elizabeth II would still be our Queen today, albeit with 30 years on the throne, not the 60 years we are on the cusp of celebrating in 2012. The abdication crisis turns 75.

King Edward VIII in his coronation robes Photo: Illustrated London News

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Kenyan Independence

On December 12, 1963, Her Britannic Majesty Queen Elizabeth II attained the title Queen of Kenya – in the twelfth year of her reign. Exactly one year later, or 366 days, on December 12, 1964, Her Britannic Majesty was no longer to reign over “the land of endless sunshine.”

The Last Farewell by Anglo-Kenyan singer Roger Whittaker:

My Land Is Kenya – also by Whittaker:

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Hardinge Giffard, 1st Earl of Halsbury

Hardinge Giffard, 1^st Earl of Halsbury

Hardinge Giffard was born on September 23, 1823 – in the reign of George IV. He passed on, 98 years old, 90 years ago today – on December 11, 1921. Lord Halsbury was the most prominent opponent in the House of Lords of what was to become the Parliament Act 1911, whose centenary is marked this year.

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The Stately Homes of England

We only keep them up for Americans to rent...

Some of England's peers have found more creative solutions. They not only inhabit their ancestral piles, but run them as businesses too, dangling their glittery goods like fishing lures to attract much-needed cash. "In the United States, we tend to have a romantic view of owning a great British estate," says Tom Savage, the director of museum affairs at Winterthur, the 175-room Delaware estate of the late chemical heir Henry Francis du Pont, which houses the foremost collection of American furniture and decorative objects. "But often the veil falls when you see inheritors to whom collecting is not a choice but an encumbering obligation: Out of economic necessity, they're doing everything in their power to hold on to what they've got."

...and Noel Coward.

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The Naval Hymn

Cross-posted at Royal Salute

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Roger Scruton - The City and The Soul

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The Duke and the Windmills

Reports The Sunday Telegraph:

In a withering assault on the onshore wind turbine industry, the Duke said the farms were “a disgrace”.

He also criticised the industry’s reliance on subsidies from electricity customers, claimed wind farms would “never work” and accused people who support them of believing in a “fairy tale”.

Writes Clive Aslet:

You have to hand it to the Duke of Edinburgh. At 90, he is still as incisive as ever. Once again, the Royal family has articulated what ordinary people, without the ear of the media, have long felt. His son might have called the wind farms that are besmirching our mountains and waving their giant arms inanely out at sea “a monstrous carbuncle”. Prince Philip chose “disgrace”. So they are.

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Remembering In Flanders Fields

IN FLANDERS FIELDS

In Flanders fields the poppies blow

Between the crosses, row on row,

That mark our place; and in the sky

The larks, still bravely singing, fly

Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago

We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,

Loved and were loved, and now we lie

In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:

To you from failing hands we throw

The torch; be yours to hold it high.

If ye break faith with us who die

We shall not sleep, though poppies grow

In Flanders fields.

I memorized the poem, many years ago, as I'm sure you did. It is a ritual of Canadian childhood. While achieving acclaim in America, it never become indelible in the American mind. Through out the Empire and Commonwealth it achieved iconic status, spurring the creation of the poppy campaigns seen every November. The poppy somewhat confuses Americans. For the Chinese it has other connotations.

The reading of the poem, the solemn viewing of grainy film, the occasional visit by an aged veteran - in my case a Canadian participant in the Great Escape - is part of the catechism of Canadianism. Why did they die? For freedom. Why did they suffer? For Canada.

It was all a very earnest attempt, by ernest teachers, to impart, as best they could, the nature of a war few of them experienced. They - unlike most of us - knew someone who was there. An uncle, a father, a grandfather. The names chiselled on walls that were only names to us, were to them family names and off-tint photographs.

To most of us, the students, the ritual, however much we wanted to feel what we were suppose to feel, was largely empty. There can be no places further apart, in mind and feel, than Flanders in 1917 and Canada today. We were much too lucky to understand. There was no personal connection. The odd student had escaped from a far away war-torn country, but was often too young to recall or understand. Most our families had not fought in the war. Our ancestors were buried elsewhere and for other reasons.

The war became real to me, as far as it can to someone like me, when attending the University of Toronto. It was the same school that John McCrae attended, more than a century before me. His name is inscribed near Soldiers' Tower. The names that had been inscribed at my elementary school were names from along ago, from people who were adults. They were two steps removed.

The names at Soldiers' Tower had been my age. They had walked the same halls. The difference between myself and them was only the accident of time. Most of the names were those of officers. In addition to all the burdens of war, these early twenty-somethings had the burdens of command. Imagine yourself at that age, trying not only to survive but to lead others into life and death. Only chance separated myself and them, as it had separated the survivors and those on the wall.

For all our secularism, and professed multiculturalism, we are still at root a Christian country. Except in the very early years of Canada there has always been, at least in English Canada, a fairly strict separation of church and state. The rhythms of our culture, as of most Western literature and art, however are Christian.

When the word sacrifice is used in remembrance ceremonies its origin, and echo, is Christian. It is Christ on the Cross. Just as He suffered for us, they the soldiers suffered for us. To the believer, then, November 11th has a double meaning, as it would have to those who first marked Armistice Day nine decades ago. Even a comparatively secular contemporary writer, Rudyard Kipling, infused his short short The Gardener with Christian allusion and allegory.

For good, and ill, Christianity is no longer the living religion it was then, or even thirty or forty years ago. It is seen today as a weekend hobby, resorted to in times of crisis, and then pushed to back of mind. Little, arguably nothing, has come to replace that living force in our culture. David Warren alluded to this in a recent column on Faith and Freedom. You can deny, as I do, that freedom requires faith. It does require, however, some sort of system of belief and value. A nation driven by whim and will is not a nation that will long be free. The Founders of both Canada and America understood this fact. They deferred, to a greater or lesser extent, to religion to provide that moral backbone for society.

While the message of sacrifice lingers in modern Canadian culture, the existence of evil is denied. There is no evil, we are told, only misunderstanding and reaction to suffering. This is why Remembrance Day has become only a ritual. Its meaning is lost, not only because of time, but because the spirit of that age is gone.

They who built the Cenotaphs and Soldiers' Towers believed in suffering, in redemption and in evil. Re-read the poem above, that last jarring stanza. "Take up our quarrel with the foe." The message delivered by those earnest school teachers is the pointlessness of war. That is not, however, what John McCrae believed. Like most of his generation, like most of those thousands of Canadians who lie buried with him in northwestern Europe, they believed in evil. More than this, they believed they fought for something good and against something evil. War was horrible, yes, but it was sometimes necessary to fight evil.

We all die, some of us die in great pain. From disease, from famine and from natural disaster. What separates death from natural causes, however horrific, and war is morality. War is a product of human thought and action, and so can and must be judged morally. That is why we remember and must, because of the moral dimension of war. We do not honour suffering for its own sake, we honour it because of what they sought to preserve. Let me close by quoting another poem, one that would have been familiar to John McCrae and his fellow officers:

Then out spake brave Horatius,

The Captain of the Gate:

"To every man upon this earth

Death cometh soon or late.

And how can man die better

Than facing fearful odds,

For the ashes of his fathers,

And the temples of his gods,

And for the tender mother

Who dandled him to rest,

And for the wife who nurses

His baby at her breast,

And for the holy maidens

Who feed the eternal flame,

To save them from false Sextus

That wrought the deed of shame?"

It's from Macaulay's The Lays of Ancient Rome. Churchill memorized the poem while at Harrow. It was a standard text for generations of schoolboys. It faded from the curriculum in the years after the First World War. Macaulay was a Christian memorializing the feats of Roman pagans. While their creeds separated the stoical Romans from Victorian Englishmen, the themes of honour, duty, family and values worth fighting for crossed that divide. That we modern Canadians cannot understand Macaulay, and cannot understand that last stanza of In Flanders Field, is the unacknowledged tragedy of the last century.

The torch; be yours to hold it high.

Originally posted November 11th, 2010

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Why is the monarchy still useful to us do you think?

Young Fogey on BBC: "I think really the crown epitomises the equivalent of the soul of the man in philosophy. It is the life force of the state. Everything we have in this country emanates from the crown, it is the source of all power, but it also upholds those fundamental pillars of civil society. It is the national focal point - most countries of the world are born out of bloodshed and independence, like Independence Day in America and Bastille Day in France – we don’t have that, so the crown is the focal point for our national identity. We come together as a nation, it unites us as a people. Social cohesion comes into being through things like royal weddings and diamond jubilees, and through that it gives us in an era of globalisation, when we seem to be unsure of who we are, it provides us with that grounding element that we need. In addition to that it is the supreme example of civic duty, the monarchy exemplifies the Big Society, the concepts of engaging in philanthropic activities and engaging in charitable endeavors, and also very much the issue of moral leadership, through examples of the Queen and her mother through self-sacrifice and dedication to duty.

So those are the things that the sovereign and crown serve as head of the nation as opposed to just head of state. Head of state is the constitutional functions, opening parliaments and signing bills - but as head of the nation, the Queen and the monarchy are the spiritual and social heart of the nation. Those are two separate roles. I don’t think any other form of government enables the playing of those two things together."

You can listen to the rest of the Young Fogey BBC interview here.

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"A serious country cannot have a viceroy as its chief of state"

So says Conrad Black, who is himself a monarchist, a Catholic and a Lord. The problem is not the monarchy, writes Lord Black, the issue for non-British Commonwealth realms is its non-resident status:

As for Canada, its problem with the monarchy is that it is non-resident and, literally, un-Canadian. If the Cambridges were here for one or more five-year terms, they would be a smash, not least as ambassadors for Canada opposite other countries. (This is no rap on David Johnston, an outstandingly qualified Governor-General in every respect.)

If for any reason, some such idea as this is not a runner, the governor general should become a co-chief of state with the monarch, and not just a stand-in. A serious country cannot have a viceroy as its chief of state other than for two weeks every three years or so when a monarch from overseas, however distinguished, and who is officially shared with other countries, is physically present in Canada.

We have good people and good institutions. What is needed is a little creative thinking. The republicans, pounding the table and just demanding the abolition of the monarchy, are not contributing much to what should be an interesting and certainly is a timely, discussion.

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My meeting with the Prime Minister

Meeting Prime Minister Harper 17th October 2011 (Photo by Jill Thompson)

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How we did it

A number of military publications have asked for our story on the successful campaign to bring back the RCN and RCAF. This is what we wrote.

With the suppression in 1968 of the RCN and RCAF a significant part of Canada's military heritage was lost. Now, forty-three years later, the historic identities of the Royal Canadian Navy, the Canadian Army and the Royal Canadian Air Force have been restored to the Canadian Forces.

Our campaign to restore the "Royal Honours" began in 2007 by making optimal use of the tools available to us. There was an online petition, a website, a blog and the use of promotional and patriotic videos. We eventually gained access to thousands of comments and email addresses from signatories of the petition that were especially used to maximum effect during key moments of the campaign.

A reconnaissance of the matter revealed the certain minefields that lay before us: the emotional hot-button issue of 'unification', the symbolism of the prefix 'Royal', the invariable canard over 'cost' and 'effort', political and cultural biases, and even the monarchy itself. It was important for us to avoid these distractions and remain focused on the task before us: to convince the government of the virtue of restoring the Royal titles within the existing unified command of the Canadian Forces.

Not unexpectedly, we encountered some stiff resistance. When MP Laurie Hawn agreed to sponsor our petition in 2007, researchers in the Library of Parliament wrote that it would take mountains of paperwork, require royal proclamations and up to 67 statutory amendments to enact. While we were prepared to move Heaven and Earth, this torrent of misinformation was a setback that did somewhat delay our progress.

Fortunately, in due course, we received the opinion of Dr. Christopher McCreery, an authority in the matter of 'Titles and Honours', who confirmed that the RCN and RCAF were never actually abolished, that they indeed still subsisted as merged entities within the CF, and that the Minister of National Defence could simply resume usage of the titles by virtue of the executive authority already available to him.

We had thought that the then-upcoming Canadian Naval Centennial would be the catalyst to 'Give the Navy its name back!' as Senator Joseph Day so passionately argued in the media, but head of the navy Vice-Admiral Dean McFadden's 'don't rock the boat' message sent a negative chill throughout the navy that spilled over into the Naval Officers Association whose support we thought critical. Although we were perplexed by Adm. McFadden's lack of enthusiasm for our project, he may have foreseen that the restoration of our military and naval heritage and the symbolism of monarchy were mutually reinforcing in a potentially powerful way, and that the navy may not be immune to possible divisions emanating from certain quarters of the country. The admiral had 'bigger fish to fry'.

Things were moving rather slowly until, incredibly, in October 2010, a motion by Senator Bill Rompkey to change the universally unloved 'Maritime Command' to (not the Royal) 'Canadian Navy' made it onto the floor of the Senate. When the Standing Senate Committee on National Security and Defence chose to hold hearings on the matter, we knew that things had finally come to a head. It was then that we were called by the Prime Minister's Office.

We learned that PM Harper was sympathetic to the restoration (initially this only concerned the Navy though it only made sense that the Air Force would be included as well), but that the government would remain neutral while the matter was being deliberated in the Senate. We were advised that although the petition was informative, it was imperative to demonstrate the support of most, if not all, veteran groups and ex-service associations, as a necessary precondition to government action. We were also encouraged to keep the MND and the PMO abreast of our progress.

The Senate hearings proceeded, albeit with an apparent bias in favour of 'Canadian Navy', even though most senators on the committee, led by Senators Day, Plett and Manning, argued in support of the navy's traditional designation. When we blitzed the Senate Committee with what the Chair, Sen. Pamela Wallin termed our 'orchestrated email campaign', it was to ensure that the senators were aware of the names of the thousands who had signed the petition; especially after one retired admiral testified that he had not met a single person who wanted a return to the RCN!

Over the next eight months, a collaborative relationship with the PMO developed which, while not a guarantee of success, gave us a growing confidence that culminated on December 14th, 2010, when the Senate unanimously passed a revised motion encouraging the government to adopt a title with the word 'Navy' in it. We sensed victory. The prospect of the "Royal Canadian Navy" would live to fight another day.

The imperative to win further support from stakeholder groups did, however, seem to present a rather daunting challenge. Although we undoubtedly had the overwhelming favour of veterans at the grassroots level, we were disappointed that the national executives of the Naval Officers Association, the Air Force Association and even the Royal Canadian Legion were all initially opposed, arguing that the government would not be able to defend either the effort or the cost.

Not confident that they were speaking on behalf of their membership, we communicated directly with individual branches and organisations across the country, with very positive results. This included literally dozens of associations, most especially the National Council of Veteran Associations, an umbrella organization representing 58 distinct veteran groups all led by Canada's beloved 'Mr. Veteran', Cliff Chadderton. These results would make the government sufficiently comfortable, but the effort to maximize stakeholder support would continue until the eve of the Minister's historic announcement made from HMC Dockyard Halifax on 16 August 2011.

We are enormously gratified that our campaign was successful, for our deserving veterans and those retired and serving members of the forces who have long dreamed of this day. That a solid majority of Canadians, across all spectra, support the restoration is tremendously satisfying.

May the RCN and RCAF remain impregnable fortresses from this day forward, whatever the tint of future governments - and may the pride of our military men and women be well served because of it.

Beaverbrook is a graduate of the Royal Military College of Canada and a former naval officer. Gregory Benton is a past Regimental Chaplain of the Royal Regiment of Canada.

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The Need for Imagination – the future of the monarchy in Australia

As the the Queen and Duke of Edinburgh’s latest tour of Australia has passed its halfway mark and nears its end, it is worth reflecting on the state of the monarchy, the activity of the republican movement and what is required from our side to secure the monarchy’s future.

The first feature of this visit is the evergreen popularity of the Queen. I think the crowds are bigger and warmer than any I have seen for her than at any other time in the last 20 years. During walkabouts, there have been frequent spontaneous renditions by the crowds of God Save the Queen – an anthem not played in this country in an official capacity away from her presence for over twenty years - wherever she goes. Crowds have been 20 and 30 people deep.  The media management has been masterful, too - royal tour coverage dominates rolling news channels during the day and the Queen and Duke landed in Canberra at the start of the 6pm news bulletins in Sydney and Melbourne.  Flawless timing. 

So, where does this leave the republicans?

The politics of republicanism in Australia are now clear – there is nowhere near enough support to carry the necessary referendum to abolish the monarchy and establish a republic. Australia’s baby-boomer elite have begun to realise that they will die as subjects of the Queen or her successors. This article, by Australia’s pre-eminent political commentator, the Australian’s Paul Kelly, shows how raw this is for them. Kelly (the former husband of a Labor minister from the 1980s) accepts the battle is lost but can’t bear to face the monarchy in its triumph. He is by no means alone.

So what is to be done?

I think the monarchy (preferably the Queen before the end of her reign) needs to reach out to them and bring them into the tent. In no other realm is the “disconnect” between the monarch and local elites so pronounced. While it’s not a tactical problem for the Crown because it will always win an insiders-vs-outsiders referendum, the strategic problem remains. I don’t just want the bomb’s fuse to be extinguished, I want to dismantle the bomb.

For non-political elites, I think the answer is easy and lies in restoring an older part of the Australian honours system. If all Companions of the Order of Australia were offered to be upgraded to a knight or dame to join the few living AKs left (similar to New Zealand’s move last year), then the nub of republican support would instantly be given “buy-in” with the monarchy and so the two would be reconciled. I suspect we would see similar take-up rates to NZ, and public life would be enhanced (as would the Crown’s cause). In my view, this scenario can only realistically occur with Tony Abbott becoming prime minister, and would be made easier by investitures personally conducted by the Queen. Plausible, but by no means certain.

The real challenge is to negotiate some sort of truce between the monarchy and Labor. Labor has deep Irish-inspired republican roots, resents the existence of vice-regal reserve constitutional powers (and has spectacularly suffered from them twice), and values republicanism’s utility as a low-cost symbolic issue that connects its two core constituencies – blue collar workers from a non-English speaking background, and urban social progressives. This is all in addition to the frequent suspicion that social democrats and others on the Left have for inherited privilege and the hereditary principle. Asking Labor to accept the monarchy is like asking Labor to deny its success since embracing cultural nationalism and moving beyond being a purely class-based party (which meant endless electoral defeat). This is THE challenge for our cause in my country but I have not found a long-term solution yet - I am hopeful the Palace will.  If the Palace and its Australian friends and advisers can come up with a solution to this, then its long term future is assured. Until then, though, vigilance remains needed.

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Young Canadian Monarchist Defends...

A young Canadian monarchist, Tom Richards, defends the Canadian monarchy:

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The Governor Returns to Government House!

Regular readers of this blog will be well aware of the successful restoration of the traditional titles "Royal Canadian Navy" and "Royal Canadian Air Force".

To Australian readers, perhaps the closest thing to this cause has been the fight to return the Governor of New South Wales - the oldest office of public administration in Australia - to their traditional residence, Government House, a beautiful Gothic Revival home pile next to Sydney Harbour.

Well, it appears the fight has, like our Canadian friends, been won!

The present Premier of NSW has announced that Her Excellency Prof. Marie Bashir, and her husband Sir Nicholas Shehadie, will return to Government House before the end of the year - first, to the chalet next to Government House previously used as a residence for the official secretary to the Governor, and then to a wing in the main residence once repair and restoration works are finished.

It has been known widely in Sydney circles for some time that both Prof Bashir and Sir Nick were very keen to return to past practice, although of course they did not voice that publicly. At a function earlier this year at Government House, Sir Nick explained to me in some detail, and with passion, his views on the matter. I was delighted to be in full agreement!

This is great news and helps to restore the lustre and dignity of the office of Governor of New South Wales. The fact that it is happening on the watch of Prof Bashir - governor since 2001 and a widely admired community figure - is doubly satisfying.

Now, if only she could be "Dame Marie"...

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Roger Scruton - Why Beauty Matters

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Hero: The Life and Legend of Lawrence of Arabia

Hero: The Life and Legend of Lawrence of Arabia, Michael Korda, Harper, 792 pages

I am an enormous fan of Lawrence of Arabia, David Lean's classic 1962 movie. I had read T.E. Lawrence's Revolt in the Desert years ago and made a mental note to try to track down a good biography of this famously enigmatic figure. Lead to to this book by a positive review in The Economist I was not disappointed. The author, somewhat ironically, is the nephew of the legendary British film producer Sir Alexander Korda, who sold the film rights for Revolt in the Desert to Sam Spiegel, the producer of Lawrence of Arabia.

The film, of course, is only a semi-representative sliver of the life of T.E. Lawrence. What this biography brings is the sense that, with little effort, a dozen good films could be made from the material of this remarkable life. As mentioned in the film, Lawrence was illegitimate, his Irish gentry father having run-off with his first family's governess. That alone would give enough for a solid Edwardian potboiler. His otherwise conventional upper-class childhood built on a lie (there was no divorce from the first wife), the complex relationship with his siblings and his many precocious talents call out for Masterpiece Theatre.

Through his life Lawrence possessed a remarkable ability to enter into highest circles of academia, government and culture with little apparent effort. His youth and scandalous birth paled when compared to his obvious brilliance. Becoming an expert in half-a-dozen fields while meandering through Oxford, his greatest challenge seems to have been one of avoiding boredom. Personal connections allowed him to spend three years doing archaeological work in the then Ottoman Empire. A masterful work on crusader castles followed almost as an afterthought.

War took him to Cairo and a junior position in the Arab Bureau. His military status was always nebulous, technically spending most of the war as a temporary officer. The bureaucrats could never quite define him. Officially sent into the Arabian deserts as an observer he became, through force of will and natural strategic aptitude, the leader of a guerrilla army that helped destabilize the Ottoman Empire. A series of brilliant military victories and a mad dash for Damascus made him a legend in the region. The shrewd American reporter Lowell Thomas popularized the legend through out the world, making Lawrence an early media stars.

In the years immediately after the war he plotted with his friend Churchill, Lloyd George and a collection of Arab Princes the map of the modern Middle East. Through his charm and cunning he placed kings on the thrones of Iraq and Jordan, the latter of whose descendants still rule in one of the more civilized nations of the region. The historians have been apportioning their blame ever since on Lawrence's slender shoulders.

His talent for "backing into the limelight" was matched by his abhorrence of fame, which was in turn surpassed only by the militant suppression of his own sex drive. Korda, mercifully, keeps the psychological commentary to a minimum and leaves us with the strange facts. Nothing evil, really, just very, very odd. Did we mention he had a fraught relationship with his pious mother? The same mother who lived in sin for decades with her former employer? Make what you will of it.

After having literally shaped the destinies of nations and kings, while somehow becoming a sort of adopted son to G.B. Shaw and serving as the model for Private Meek in Too True To Be Good, Lawrence enlisted in the RAF and then the Army. Despite having been at one point a Lt. Colonel, the king maker choose to become an aircraftman, leaving the service when his identity was discovered. A stint in the Royal Tank Corp made him deeply unhappy and he, with the connivance of the highest authorities, rejoined the RAF. His fame would soon enough force his temporary relocation to a remote base in British India, then again force his return to Britain. His death at 46 in a freak motorcycle accident served as an unworthy end.

Michael Korda, who has a long list of bestselling historical works, handles the vast material with the expected deft of an old hand. The style is easy and at times elegant. Beyond the author, however, stands the subject and his amazing story, the ultimate Boy's Own adventure story combined with a fascinating history lesson.

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Australians to welcome their Queen

This coming October Her Majesty the Queen, Australia's Sovereign Head of State, will be in Australia to open this years CHOGM event. After that she will visit bush-fire victims in Victoria and flood victims in Queensland. No doubt she will receive a very warm welcome from most people. However our press is already mounting negative news headlines such as "Queen to snub Sydney". The media just don't get it and sadly probably never will.

However, ordinary Australians, as always, will welcome their Queen!

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"We are two nations, but under one Queen and united by one set of values"

British Prime Minister David Cameron's address to a joint session of the Canadian Parliament

And, of course, how could our faces not light up when we heard (yes we, the blog that brought back the RCN & RCAF!) those magnificent names bellow across the chamber in the House of Commons:

Mr Speaker, amidst all this there could not be a more fitting tribute to the brilliance of the Canadian forces- and our pride at standing side by side with them -than the recent renaming of the Maritime Command and Air Command as the Royal Canadian Navy and the Royal Canadian Air Force.

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