Tuesday, January 16, 2007

Why Monarchy? Why Tradition?

. Tuesday, January 16, 2007

I am sometimes reproached for my support of the monarchy. The standard line, little challenged by the small band of valiant Canadian monarchists, is that the monarchy is an anachronism, or useless, or expensive or undemocratic or foreign or about half a dozen other reasons, usually thrown out in no particular order. What does seem to unite the anti-monarchists - at least in Canada there is no significant movement in favour of a republic - is an emotional repugnancy toward the monarchy which grabs at whatever it can find to remove the crown from Canada. The emotion is by no means strong, really more of a nuisance they want to get rid of. I've met very few ardent republicans / anti-monarchists, it's simply not a grand enough cause to attract much attention either way. The small band of monarchists, unfortunately, often chooses equally questionable ground to defend the crown against its enemies.

The word most often used to uphold the monarchy is tradition. This in and of itself is the best argument that can be offered for the continuance of monarchical institutions in Canada. Without a resort to tradition there is simply no explaining allegiance to an eighty year old woman who, until her accession to the throne, demonstrated no particular qualifications for the position ahead of millions of other young men and women at the time. There is certainly no understanding why Canada, a sovereign nation and one of the world's leading developed nations should have as its head of state the hereditary monarchy of another country some three thousand miles away. Tradition, Canadian tradition in particular, should be the crux of the Canadian monarchists defense of the crown. What St. Paul said about the resurrection, that if it never happened he was preaching in vain, applies to the monarchy and tradition. If the monarchy were not part of Canadian history then there would be no point in having a Canadian monarchy.

Where most monarchists err is in their understanding of tradition, a vital mistake made by many conservatives as well. Tradition is cloaked in a hazy mist of warm emotions, it lacks height, width or depth. This is when the word is understood broadly, sometimes it is also seen strictly as narrow ritual, action repeated for the sake of continuity and nothing else. Others have done this before me and I carry on feeling comfort in the fellowship of those before and, one assumes, those after me. If this is all tradition can and should mean then neither it or the monarchy, to take the current case in point, can long last except as a refuge or hobby horse.

Since the Enlightenment monarchy and tradition have both suffered from two powerful intellectual forces born, or perhaps more accurately reborn and refined, in the eighteenth century; democracy and reason. The two are not necessarily complimentary forces in history or intellectual discourse. The rule of the majority and the principles of induction and deduction often have only a nodding acquaintanceship. There link with one another in the modern world has been from that other great force of the enlightenment, liberty. Liberty does not necessarily require democracy. However one understands liberty the means to maintain it are open to question. The Athenian democracy famously failed to uphold anything that might, either in modern or ancient terms, be called liberty. Britain's constitutional monarchy upheld a degree of liberty, as most English speaking moderns broadly understand it, in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries unprecedented in human history, yet less than one percent of the adult population could vote.

What system of government might best uphold liberty was the great question confronting Western political thinkers in the decades after the French Revolution. The conclusion reached, at least in the English speaking nations, was that a democracy with constitutional limitations, particularly as regards to individual rights and executive, legislative and judicial procedures, would best guarantee liberty. Without some kind of check on the power of the executive, monarchical or otherwise, tyranny was all too possible. Some kind of electoral check on the power of the executive, as expressed by the legislative branches of government could, in conjunction with checks on both branches by the judiciary, with reference to a written or unwritten constitution. The wider the franchise, it was felt, the better the check on the executive. Democracy, unlike in Athens, could uphold liberty if properly controlled. Matched with this was the more pragmatic concern about how to control a rapidly urbanizing population, Until the advent of totalitarian government in the 20th century, and all its tools of control, only some kind of democracy seemed able to achieve social stability in the 19th, if only as a peaceful outlet of discontent.

The linking of democracy with liberty was sanctified, if one will admit the abuse of the language, by reason. Liberty was, until the 20th century at least, derived to some extent from natural law arguments. These were not necessarily atheistical. They might exemplify a Newtonian / Lockean approach; divine conception but rational functioning. One big miracle and all that followed may be derived empirically. Reason explained where liberty came from and why it was important. Reason could argue that democracy worked to sustained liberty, if the nature of both were understood and reason applied in the establishment and maintenance of governments.

Tradition and monarchy have little place in this narrative. Reason asks why certain traditions exist and demands rational explanations for their continuance. Appeals to ritual continuity or divine sanction will go nowhere with the rationally minded. Appeals to faith, trying to uphold both monarchy and tradition are equally doomed on these terms. One can try to revolt against reason and liberty but on what grounds? The material and spiritual well-being that brought about the scientific, industrial and liberal revolutions of the 18th and 19th century was unprecedented. Could one really turn one's back on all that? With nothing more than a hazy appeal to tradition and faith?

Monarchy maintained itself in Britain, and what became the Commonwealth, because it became an instrument of liberty. In much of the world monarchy obstructed both democracy and liberty; in Britain it ensured that liberty was preserved as genuine mass democracy emerged. Given that only a handful of nations achieved this feat, and only one, the United States, was a republic, this might at first have helped the image of the monarchy as co-defender of liberty with limited democracy. Instead as time past the monarchy, which might be praised for its role in ushering in liberal democracy, was now seen as dispensable. Its services rendered to the people, the people were all grown up and could do without. Don't let the palace gates hit you on the way out.

Monarchists cannot, as they could a century ago, argue that freedom requires a monarchy to hold back the worst excesses of oligarchy or democracy. If even the French can run a republican liberal democracy then why would the English, and their commonwealth descendants, need a monarchy? Tradition was the last argument left and it was now in the public understanding as much an anachronism as monarchy itself, a process made worse by the crippling historical amnesia imposed by modern public education on the general populace. The nations of the English speaking world do not know their past or seem to aspire to anything not of the moment. If a society abhorrent of tradition has little time for the past, a society proudly ignorant of the past is far worse.

The neo-barbarians aside, tradition is necessary, but it must be tradition on rational grounds. This seems like a contradiction in terms. Tradition is historical and the historical is often accidental, not rational. An even superficial examination of the British constitution almost beggars belief. A feudal political superstructure that has over the centuries been rigged - a more polite term might be improvised - to accommodate mercantilism, laissez-faire classical liberalism, the welfare state, full blown democratic socialism and now some kind of Thatcherite-Blairite mixed economy. Only God, or whatever, knows what Gordon Brown has in store for Merry England's queer looking ship of state in the years ahead. Yet it works. Yes, the Minister of Finance is called by the absurd title of Chancellor of the Exchequer, which was originally a relatively minor office responsible for accounting procedures. The very name "exchequer" refers to a "checkered" board used by medieval officials to count tax receipts.

There is an office in the British cabinet called the Lord Privy Seal - who is, as the very old joke frequently attributed to Ted Heath goes, neither a Lord nor a Privy nor a Seal; another member of the current cabinet holds the title of Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and another is called Lord President of the Council, which perplexes Americans to no end. "How can someone be a Lord and a President and what Council are you talking about?" When they are told that the Lord President is a mid-ranking member of the Cabinet you might as well end the conversation there. Explaining how the office of Prime Minister has been in existence since about 1721, yet there was no mention of the word Prime Minister on any legal documents until 1905, and that even today the powers of the office are determined more by convention than anything written down in black and white, is simply inexplicable to most.

It all works because the men and women who operate and support the British constitution accept certain core values, values which themselves have been evolved, or discovered, through trial and error guided by certain theoretical principles, which in their turn have also evolved and changed over time. What makes the British constitution work in the form it is in today is tradition. The judges wearing whigs and black robes, allusions to medieval origins of the participant's roles and the common law itself, or the bizarre custom of referring to the Speaker or Lord Chancellor when responding to another parliamentarian's questions, are all tangible symbols of tradition. They are all, however, accidental products of history. One could do away with the form and the substance would probably remain of what was being said or decided. A house stripped of ornamentation or styling is no less structurally sound.

Tradition in form or procedure is akin to ornamentation. Traditional values, beliefs or attitudes are something else. That a belief, a value or an attitude is traditional, i.e historical, gives it no inherent normative value. Most societies have their own conservatives denouncing the evils of modernizers or "liberals" and decrying the decline of "traditional values." With the exception of Anglo-Saxon based societies these conservatives are typically little more than primitive tribalists and medievalists in spirit, decrying the march of individual liberty, the rule of law, rational discourse and liberal democracy. Our conservatives are generally better because the values they are trying to conserve are better. No one, however, is seriously arguing in the debate over the monarchy that Her Majesty be given real decision making power. The debate over the monarchy is a debate over symbols and not directly values. This may seem an odd distinction - aren't symbols meaningless without values? - but in our current cultural climate a separate argument must first be made for the importance of symbols, a necessity unimaginable only two generations ago.
A symbol is a concretization. Every human being, even the most depraved of the moderns, needs something tangible, something to point to and say to themselves and others: "This is what I believe," or "this is what I am." The thing being symbolized, and it must be a thing, an abstract thought does not serve the same function, itself has little intrinsic value or meaning. A flag is a piece of cloth, a crown a golden trinket, we imbued these things with meaning because we need the hard fact before us. The thing itself is almost incidental, it needs to be a thing but what kind is open. We could idolize a rock, many cultures have, but few sophisticated cultures choose to do so. It helps if the symbol chosen tells a story. The symbolic is traditional and the traditional is often accidental, but that does not make either random. It is accidental that you met your wife at Union Station on a Tuesday afternoon as you both reached for a Snickers bar. Your choice of this particular women as your wife is not accidental. The American flag has thirteen strips, alternating red and white, overlain with a blue canton holding fifty white stars in its top left hand corner. Each of those elements has a historical origin. The fact that there are thirteen stripes is purely accidental. Had Benedict Arnold succeeded in his 1775-1776 expeditions to Quebec he might have gone down in history as a hero, and the American flag would have contained fourteen stripes. The detail is accidental, the meaning is anything but. Neither are the emotions.

The need to have symbols relates to man's nature - yes we do have a nature - as emotional beings. As The Monarchist recently pointed out:

Republics are bloodless abstractions. We all know this. We all know they are founded upon conceptual notions such as equality, fraternity and liberty, rather than the more tangible drivers that are the soul of monarchies, like human connection, continuity and experience.

This is rather too harsh. The American Republic was founded on a conceptual notion, which in its first principles was as radical then as now, yet it too acquired traditions and symbols that were not bloodless. For America to become a monarchy would be as much a betrayal of her traditions and her symbols as if we abandoned our monarchy. The common thread is the emotional link with the symbols and the traditions. The great dichotomy of Western thought, the supposed conflict between mind and body, between reason and emotions, has lead many monarchists into the trap that monarchy cannot be defended on rational grounds. Monarchy is traditional and emotional, something hazy, as I described at the beginning of this piece, something soft that is disintegrating in the hardness of the modern world. Yet emotions are not necessarily irrational, they can and should be integrative.

An emotion, as Ayn Rand among others identified, is a sum of thoughts, beliefs and experiences. An emotion tells you something about yourself, about your current situation that it might take hours or years to describe abstractly in words. Emotions are not necessarily antagonistic to reason they should be complimentary, This does not mean we can substitute emotions for reason. If the intellectual history of emotions, how they are perceived by individuals and society, was in the nineteenth century all about repression, since the 1960s it has been all about "liberation." In truth the "liberation" was little more than replacing a weakening repression with near total anarchy. If feels right do it, damn the facts, the precise observe of the previous attitude which was damn your emotions look at the facts, or social convention. Emotions are also facts, not existential ones, but they are real none the less and are providing you information.

In either case there was only fitful attempts to integrate reason with emotion, to understand why and how rather than to pretend. The repression of the past and the anarchy of the present are both forms of pretense, albeit the later allowed for some measure of social cohesion. A better understanding of emotions will help us have a better understanding of tradition, that tradition can be both emotional and rational, that symbols can be both rational and emotional and that allegiance to the crown can be both rational and emotional.

The crown is a living symbol of Canada's peaceful constitutional development. We do not settle our political disputes by violence, we do so through argument in public debate. The mob does not rule in Canada, neither do a few men in dark corners. We are a free nation and the way be became a free nation was by the route of constitutional monarchy. Other nations have other traditions. They are not necessarily better or worse, again, tradition is not normative outside of a philosophical and historical context. Each family has its heirlooms that are usually worthless to outsiders. These trinkets have their history and their emotional context.

An individual's symbol reinforces his or her individuality, a family symbol their unity, a national symbol its unity. In Canada, unlike in America, or France, or Germany or Portugal, freedom wears a crown. Certainly the history of the crown in Britain is complex and occasionally bloody. I would have fought with Cromwell at Naseby, have been steadfast with Shaftesbury during the Exclusion Crisis and cheered the Seven Immortals as they went off to summon William of Orange onto the throne and into British history and tradition. We stand at the endpoint, so far, of a tradition. Its sum makes the Crown a symbol of liberty today. The American colonists too viewed the monarchy as a symbol of liberty, until the monarch of the day, and his government, betrayed them. Our history tells a different story and we derived a different tradition. In that spirit, with wholeness of heart and mind, let me say:

Vivat Regina!

Originally Posted at The Gods of the Copybook Headings

9 comments:

The Monarchist said...

Thank you for reposting this, Kipling. I'm going to save it under Treasured Posts.

Onizuka said...

I see so much talk from the republican side in the media and in the public, and so few for the crown, I had even begun to doubt myself, and why i felt so loyal to it, as oppose to the "country" they seem to sprout but what I never seem to see the advantages of.
I thank you for restoring my faith, given me a sword to fight back, where before i had alway been on the defensive

thank you. God Save the Queen.

Unrepentant Jacobite said...

No one, however, is seriously arguing in the debate over the monarchy that Her Majesty be given real decision making power.

I, for one, would certainly argue for this, at least as far as judicial matters are concerned. At least, make the Monarch the final court of appeal above the Supreme Court. The title of "Lord/Lady High Justice of the Realm", along with some real decision-making power, would be a good thing in my perspective.

For it is wrong that the Monarchy - currently Windsor rather than Stuart - has been reduced to figure head status. That makes England and the Commonwealth nothing better than "crowned republics". And that is just dead wrong.

Anonymous said...

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JazzMan said...

Emotional symbolism sounds great but when the interest of the queen intervenes in the politics and economics of a free nation then the monarchy is simply outdated. Are we all equal or not. Kingship is bases on imperialistic imposiontion that is it's only tradition. Only liberal as far as the mocharchy isn't affected quite convenient state of affairs. For that matter I would be a communist as long as it doesn't apply to me.
The roots of Canada also deeply lie in its indegenous people which you conveniently avoided as emotional symbols of Canada but you like most Canadian would conveniently left that fact out of the pictures. Thanks for your post but your argument is very weak and poorly reason leaning on the side of faith. Tell me if you really believe that the monarchy was chosen by providence? or Instead imposed by humans.

Claud Curt said...

I have nothing much to say but just to tell you that these artworks are magnificent. breast Lift San Francisco

Anonymous said...

Dear Garrotero,

You write:

'Emotional symbolism sounds great but when the interest of the queen intervenes in the politics and economics of a free nation then the monarchy is simply outdated.'

Aside from receiving Civil List funds, in what way does the 'interest' of the present Queen 'interfere in the politics and economics of a free nation'? Moreover, in what sense is the monarchy 'outdated', and why do you suppose political structures ought to be spoken of like computer chips, as if they could be good one day and bad the next?

'Are we all equal or not.'

Emphatically not.

'Kingship is bases on imperialistic imposiontion that is it's only tradition.'

I hope sincerely that English is not your first language. I have no idea what this is supposed to mean.

'Only liberal as far as the mocharchy isn't affected quite convenient state of affairs.'

Please clarify this sentence.

'For that matter I would be a communist as long as it doesn't apply to me.'

I'm sure that would make sense if the previous two sentences had been intelligible.

'The roots of Canada also deeply lie in its indegenous people...'

In what way?

'...which you conveniently avoided as emotional symbols of Canada...'

Only inasmuch as any completely irrelevant topic is 'conveniently ignored' in any piece of writing.

'...but you like most Canadian would conveniently left that fact out of the pictures.'

Supra.

'Thanks for your post but your argument is very weak and poorly reason leaning on the side of faith.'

Whereas you have no argument at all that I can extract from your incoherent scribblings, unless it is that monarchy is somehow contrary to freedom(which you have not established and which we would all dispute) or to equality(which is itself contrary to freedom).

'Tell me if you really believe that the monarchy was chosen by providence? or Instead imposed by humans.'

I'll leave this question to the author for whom it was intended.

As an aside, in response to RTH's comment that 'No one, however, is seriously arguing in the debate over the monarchy that Her Majesty be given real decision making power.', I can only say that I am, and I can think of a few other monarchists, including at least one of The Monarchist's own scribes, who would probably agree.

Gynecomastia Treatment Men said...

Good luck getting people behind this one. Though you make some VERY fascinating points, youre going to have to do more than bring up a few things that may be different than what weve already heard. What are trying to say here? What do you want us to think? It seems like you cant really get behind a unique thought. Anyway, thats just my opinion. Facelift San Francisco

Anonymous said...

If there is a Monarch,then the rules should be followed and the correct one in place.
And that person is King Micheal (Plantagenet),who is residing in Australia.
See Britains real monarch, by Tony Robinson on Youtube.!
Micheal though,is a Republican.
In any day and age having a Royal family is Madness! They are just ordinary people(more interbred maybe) Descended from bullies,thieves,murderers. Which is how they cam to be in their positions.
I wonder, if the queen had free reign today, would we see heads rolling, innocents locked in the Tower etc ?

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Loyal Subject: Speak out Charles, our teenage politicians never will
Prince Charles at 60: 60 Facts About HRH, Prince Charles of Wales
Remembrance Day Hymns: O Valiant Hearts; Abide With Me
For Liberty and Livelihood! Duke of Norfolk leads hunt protest ban
Keating Remembers: "I have never been to Gallipoli, and I never will"
John Cleese a Republican? An anti-monarchist rant worthy of Monty Python
Balfour Declaration: The precursor to the Statute of Westminster
Beaverbrook's Grandson: SAS Major Sebastian Morley resigns in disgust
"His Mightiness": Yanks and the royals; the Eagle and the Crown
England Expects: The Hero of Trafalgar at 250
Harper and Howard: An embarrassing example of Anglosphere Unity
Crowning Insult: Labour's legacy will be its destruction of the monarchy
Her Excellency: An Interview with Governor-General Quentin Bryce
Age of Oversensitivity: Churchill wouldn't stand a chance in Canadian election
William of Wales: Prince chooses RAF career over that of a 'working Royal'
Australia's Loyal Opposition: Republican Turnbull now on Queen's side
Loyal Subject: The Age of Elizabeth II, by A.N. Wilson
Tory Icon? Daniel Hannan says British Tories should follow Stephen Harper
Chasing Churchill: Around the world with Winston
Her Majesty The Queen - A Life in Film
The Crown in Oz: Australia swears in first female governor-general
Lèse majesté? The Royal Australian Institute of Architects drops the 'royal'
Rest In Peace: David Lumsden of Cushnie (1933-2008), President of the 1745 Assn.
Monarchies Rule: Prominent Australian republican says monarchies are the best
Sir Don Bradman: Oz remembers The Don, the greatest cricketer batsman of all time
Padre Benton: The Living Tradition in Piddingworth
"Stodgy anachronism" More moist, vapid effusions from the Diana cult
Drool Britannia: London Summer Olympics 2012
Taki the Aristocrat: Unrepentedly wealthy and well mannered
Wanted: Uncorker Message in a bottle faster than Royal Mail
The Other St. George: Will Georgia restore its monarchy?
Gentlemen's Clubs: The Great Club Revolution of New York
The Laughing Cavalier: What an utterly absurd article
Health unto His Future Majesty: "Royalty dares to challenge the New Order"
"Grace, Your Grouse!" Better to kill a fellow gun than wing a beater
Boys will be adventurous: To Ulaanbaatar by London cab
A King's Breakfast: A trenchant defence of the full English breakfast
Republican beer: Forget Coopers, support Fosters
Trafalgar Square: Sanity prevails on the fourth plinth
The Empire Builder: How James Hill built a railroad without subsidies
"Harvard was not amused": Alexander Solzhenitsyn, 1918–2008
Greatest Briton: Wellington is "greater than Churchill"
Death of the Necktie? A well-tied tie is the first serious step in life
Not Amused: The next Chief Justice of Australia to be a republican
Royal New Zealand Air Force: God Save N.Z. from the Cannibals
Why English Pubs are Dying: The totalitarian smoking ban.
Swooning over Princess Obama: A Coronation or the Second Coming?
Dreams of an Academic: Gough Whitlam to have the last laugh?
Joshua Slocum meet President Kruger: Yet another reason to love the Boers
Changing of the Guard: Annual Inspection at Rideau Hall
H.M.S. Iron Duke: A Foe for William and Sea Room
Fountain of Honour: Australian pop star gets Order of the British Empire
DOMINION DAY: Read David Warren's Lament for a Nation
Kiwi Tribalism: Sealords, Treelords, what are New Zealanders coming to?
Of Queen and Country: John Elder disects the current state of monarchy in Oz
Not Amused: The Olympic Games trump Buckingham Palace
CMR Returns: The Royal Military College of St. John
Hereditary peers overwhelmingly rejected the Lisbon Treaty
Archbishop Cranmer: Royal Assent given to the Treaty of Lisbon
Crown Commonwealth: Referendum confirms Her Majesty as Queen of Tuvalu
Duke of York: Prince Andrew Visits Troops in Afghanistan
Treaty of Lisbon: A Litmus Test for the British Monarchy
The Queen and I: The man who caused royal kerfuffle gives view of the monarchy
HMS Ontario sunk in 1780, found intact! at bottom of Lake Ontario
Hold the Lime, Bartender: Only lemon properly complements a gin and tonic
Elizabethans Down Under: Are most Australian monarchists merely "Elizabethans"?
Edwardian Gentleman: What To Do When You Find a Hohenzollern in Your Study
Hooray for Kid's Day!! Melbourne newspaper won't come of Age
Unhappy Kingdom: Why Liberal Democracy is Failing Us
Knightless Realm: The world yawns as John Howard is made an AC
Scots Tory: Bring Back the Stiff Upper Lip, says Gerald Warner
HMY Britannia: Let's lay the keel for a new royal yacht
For Queen, Country and Low Pay: PM pledges to do better
Maple Leaf republic? Roger Kimball's sleight of hand (since corrected!)
Queen's Birthday: New Zealand unveils new Vice-Regal Standard
Prince Charming: Quebec author calls Canadian G-G a "negro queen"
The Senior Service: Sub-Lieutenant Wales to take on Pirates of the Caribbean
Crown of Disenchantment: What does it require to withhold royal assent?
Colonial Mentality: Key republican thinks Victoria Cross is a colonial relic
The Red Baron: Billy Bishop, not Mannock, was the British Empire's top ace
Which Scots conservatism: Unionist or Nationalist?
Loyal Subject: After all she has done, we owe the Queen our oath
Victoria Day – Fête de la Reine: Official B'day of the Queen of Canada
Renaming the Victoria Day Weekend: Let's get rid of Heritage Day Bob
Pro Valore: Canada mints its own Victoria Cross in time for Victoria Day
State Visit to Turkey: Mustafa Akyol says God Save the Queen, Indeed
Norn Iron Unites: What issue is uniting all parties of Northern Ireland?
Extreme Loyalist: Michael Stone attempted to slit the throats of Adams and McGuinness because he just "can't handle" republicans being in government.
Canada's Vice-Regal dubbed an elegant mix between Lady Di and Nelson Mandela
Queen of Australia: Support for Australian republic hits new low
A Heroes Welcome: The Windsor Castle Royal Tattoo, 8-10 May 2008
Fat, Vile and Impudent: Alan Fotheringham is back on the bottle
The Devine Right of Bling: Our Royals have become hereditary celebrities
Battle of the Atlantic: Canadians remember the longest battle of WW2
Old Etonian Toff: Boris Johnson installed as Tory Mayor of London
Britain needs a Patron Saint: Cry God for Harry, Britain and St. Aiden?
Anglos in Mont-Royal: Rooting for the Montreal Canadiens
Daniel Hannan: Borders of the Anglosphere and the British Empire was a mistake
Australia 2020: One Big Fat Republican Con Job
Bye bye Tommy: O it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy go away"
For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?
Carpetbaggers Down Under: Kevin 'Mugabe' Rudd wins 98.5% support for republic
Kipling: The Jeremiah of Empire and the Poet Laureate of Civilisation
Duke of Edinburgh: Behind the gaffes is a man of real sincerity
Lord Rutherford: The Father of the Atom lives on in great great grandson
Queen of Australia: Royalty Protects us from Tyranny, David Barnett
Long Live the Broadsheet! Norumbega, more traditionalist than the Pope.
A Tale of Two Countries: Soldiers of Britain and Canada serve the same Queen but...
Loyal Subject: Polishing the Royal Crown, Matt Bondy & Brendon Bedford
Devoted to the End: Obituary of Sir Phillip Bridges
The Monarchist does not recognize the Republic of Kosova
Loyal Subject: MPs Ruse Defeated; God Save the Queen!
St. Paddy's Day: Edmund Burke, the greatest Irishman who ever lived
Not Amused: The Bunkum of Timothy Garton Ash
Hero Harry: Rave Reviews across the Commonwealth
Patriot Prince: Prince Harry fought for us all, Charles Moore
William F. Buckley, RIP: He had a Tory gratitude for the pleasures of life
Their Lordships' Duty: The House of Lords can influence the Lisbon Treaty debate
Knights of Oz: Revive Sirs or I'll have your guts for garters
Peter Hitchens: People love the Queen...and the BBC hates us for it
Our Greatest Monarch: Paul Johnson says Henry V was our greatest monarch
Princess Diana Inquest: A Dirty Raincoat Show for the World
Malcom Turnbull: 'Queen's death will spark republican vote'
Duke of York: The Royals are not "stuffed dummies". They should have their say
Peers of the Realm: The decline and fall of the House of Lords - Charles A. Coulombe
Peter Hitchens: Get rid of the monarchy and you will get rid of a guardian of liberty
THE FALL OF CHURCHILL
Honouring Sir Edmund Hillary
The Queen versus an E.U. President
Going Solo: Prince William earns his Wings
James C. Bennett: The Third Anglosphere Century
Knights of Oz: Revive Sirs or I'll have your guts for garters
Princess Diana Inquest: A Dirty Raincoat Show for the World
Malcom Turnbull: 'Queen's death will spark republican vote'
Future Peer: The life and times of Lady Victoria Beckham
Peers of the Realm: The decline and fall of the House of Lords - Charles A. Coulombe
Peter Hitchens: Get rid of the monarchy and you will get rid of a guardian of liberty


2007 ARTICLES


New York Times: Ever Backwards into the Royal Future
Peter Hitchens: People love the Queen...and the BBC hates us for it
Christopher Hitchens: An Anglosphere Future
Andrew Cusack: Republicanism is a traitor's game
DIAMOND WEDDING ANNIVERSARY
Courageous Patrician: Rt Hon Ian Douglas Smith (1919-2007)
The Last Rhodesian: What began with Rhodes and ended with Ian?
Gentleman Journalist: The Lord Baron W.F. Deedes, 1913-2007
Not Amused: Blair's sinister campaign to undermine the Queen
Loyal Subject: Queen Elizabeth: A stranger in her own country
Reverence Deference: Bowing and Scraping Back in Tradition
Rex Murphy: Kennedy, Churchill, Lincoln - The rousing bon mot is no more
Gerald Warner: Don't shed a tear for Diana cult in its death throes
The End of Grandeur: Rich, chincy Canada puts Strathmore on the blocks
Confessions of a Republican Leftie: "The Queen charmed the pants off me"
The King's Own Calgary Regiment: Cpl. Nathan Hornburg is laid to rest
The Royal Gurkha Rifles: Prince William grieves the death of Major Roberts
Queensland Mounted Rifles: Trooper David Pearce, 41, killed in Afghanistan
The Order of Canada: 100 investitures later, Canada's highest honour turns 40
Prince Edward on Prince Edward Island: Troop's link to monarchy important
HER MAJESTY THE QUEEN: Unveils the UK Armed Forces Memorial
Great Britain: "A rotten borough with a banana monarchy" - by Europhile
FADE BRITANNIA: THE UNION OF ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND IS OVER - Simon Heffer
Peers of the Realm: The decline and fall of the House of Lords - Charles A. Coulombe
Remembering 'Smithy': An obituary tour de force by Andrew Cusack here, here and here.
NOT AMUSED: Her Majesty The Queen in Right of Quebec not invited to Quebec's tercentenary