A popular decision for Minister Mackay:
A Harris/Decima survey conducted for The Canadian Press found that 56 per cent of respondents agreed with the change and only 31 per cent opposed it.
The poll suggests support is consistent across ages, genders and income levels. On partisan lines, Conservatives offered 72 per cent support, but even self-declared Liberals and New Democrats showed majority support.
Among Bloc Québécois supporters however, 74 per cent opposed the change.
Certain separatist types will never be happy. God Save the Queen! Vive La Reine!
ReplyDeleteVive la Reine du Canada!
ReplyDeleteWell, it is certainly no surprise that people who hate the very idea of Canada don't support the idea. What I find particularly telling it that 26% of those who would rather not be Canadians support the restoration of the three Services and the 'Royal' honourific!
ReplyDeleteA question from an American who is perhaps not completely up to speed on British/Canadian tradition: Why not 'Royal Canadian Army' too?
ReplyDeleteThe high minority number in Québec is indeed interesting, gentlemen. As are opinion polls with percentages in the twenties and thirties for support of restoration of regal powers, as we saw in the Kingdom of Norway just some five years ago.
ReplyDeleteI believe the missing 'Royal' for the army has to do with the English Civil War, Mr. Starrett.
Vive la Reine de la Québec!
This begs an interesting question: If the Bloc Quebecois got its way, but the Royalists within the Bloc (and the province at large) got THEIR way, which Royal Family would be enthroned?
ReplyDeleteSamstarrett,
ReplyDeleteTraditionally the British have always distrusted having a standing army based at home. Whenever an "army" was required for any particular war or campaign, it was cobbled together on an ad hoc basis. These armies therefore consisted of locally raised units (ie Regiments) provided for the purpose.
Just think of Shakespeare's Henry V addressing his Dukes at Againcourt - because it was the Dukes who actually supplied the soldiers to fight Henry's Normandy campaign.
As such, the Commonwealth tradition is focused on the various Regiments that make up the army, rather than the "Army" as it's own entity (aka the Regimental System). As a result it is the Regiments and Corps of the modern Commonwealth realms Armies that bear "Royal" honourifics (ie Royal Artillery, Royal Australian Regiment, Royal New Zealand Engineers etc).
The other two Services on the other hand have always been centrally controlled by the Crown (govt) as a homogeneous single Service; hence the RAN, RNZN, RCN, RN etc.
Rather long winded, but I hope that gets the general idea across.
Mac
Fascinating. Thank you very much, sir, for that in-depth and quite helpful explanation. My hat is off to you.
ReplyDeleteAn intellectual defense of monarchy, called "monarchy and the world" has been published at
ReplyDeletehttp://www.euppublishing.com/journal/brw
The main opposition to the title by Bloc supporters is the Canadian part. Do they view the restoration as an act of triumphalism by those scheming anglos? Yes, but that's neither here nor there, because nothing short of a totally independent, socialist republic will suit them.
ReplyDeleteHaving said that, Her Majesty is more popular in Quebec than people think. The cultural elite that control most of the media coming out of this province are overwhelmingly leftist and nationalist (more or less evenly divided between Canadian and Quebec nationalist camps), so they present an image of a homogenous, anti-monarchist, left-leaning society. So that's the image that people elsewhere in the world get. And it's a completely fabricated, mythological one. Since it's not culturally-correct here to be a monarchist, most generally try to keep quiet to avoid the wrath of the mainstream media, but a few do speak up and state, for example, the fact that she's perfectly bilingual, and can easily carry on a conversation with her francophone soldiers (which she did on her last visit, much to the pleasant surprise of that Vandoo captain), or that she's taken the time and effort to familiarize herself with Canadian French vernacular in order to properly understand and be understood in conversation, but these are never noted, and the media instead give a disproportionate amount of attention to Patrick Bourgeois and his RRQ clowns, or Amir Khadir, who called her a parasite that leaches off the lower classes. The true-blues are wary of people they don't know, and they won't open up to just anybody. But they're there, and there are a lot more of them than people think.
I am surprised to learn that Her Majesty is "bilingual" I wonder just how many languages she knows?
ReplyDeleteYes, "Leacock," it would actually be surprising that Her Britannic Majesty were only to be bilingual.
ReplyDeleteThe late Archduke Otto of Austria, who was laid to rest this summer in a Vienna that for a day was restored to her old Imperial glory, could speak a number of languages.
Yes, he was raised to be the sovereign of a multilingual empire. However, he was only 13 years a senior of Her Britannic Majesty.
If Her Britannic Majesty had any old-school monarch's education, bilingual she would not be.
I will second that, Mr. Baltzersen. Upon learning that Her Majesty was 'bilingual', my reaction was indeed 'That can't possibly be all.'
ReplyDeleteFrom the Royal family's website (www.royal.gov.uk) - "Princess Elizabeth also learned French from a number of French and Belgian governesses. It is a skill which has stood The Queen in good stead, as she often has cause to use it when speaking to ambassadors and heads of state from French-speaking countries, and when visiting French-speaking areas of Canada."
ReplyDeleteOther French speakers in the royal family include the Prince of Wales, the Duke of Cambridge,the Duke of Edinburgh, Princess Alexandra, the Duke of Kent, Prince Micheal of Kent.
I would hardly call the Duke of Cambridge a French speaker. His efforts on the recent tour of Canada, though admirable and much appreciated, were horrendous. It sounded like someone had just typed up some French words and he was reading them for the first time in his speeches. Lots of time to practise before his succession though.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteSomeone needs to moderate these comments. I mean, come on, you guys don't even block obvious spam like 'Jackson' above?
ReplyDeleteI apologize for this comment's irrelevance to the post, but I could find no other way to contact the Powers that Be at this blog. You should be aware that in addition to having a few broken links in your sidebar, such as the link to Charles Coulombe in 'Gentleman Royalists', you will find that the link to 'The Realm of J.J.' in fact points to a republican site calling itself the 'Republic of J.J.'.
ReplyDeleteDear Mr. Starrett:
ReplyDeleteI am one of this distinguished weblog's scribes, as you may know. However, I do not speak on behalf of the blog editor and proprietor.
Thank you for your concern.
The comments at this blog can be deleted by the individual post's author or the editor and proprietor.
I have contacted the editor already about the said spam.
Blogger does have cuptcha and spam detection. Unfortunately, this one went passed it. Blog moderation is an alternative, but it does have its disadvantages as well, especially if the editor does not have the capacity to approve comments on a more than daily basis. Of course, when obvious spam does get through, it should be deleted as soon as possible.
You may find the e-mail address to the editor and proprietor in the sidebar. He may make changes to the sidebar links.
As for J.J. McCullough, this is a joke. We "all" know he is a republican. The same goes for Mr. Holden.
Again, thank you.
Thank you for your time and response, sir. I had assumed that Mr. McCullough had changed his views and that the link had not been updated. I stand corrected. As for blog moderation, at Wordpress one can set it up so that an individual's first comment must be approved and subsequent comments are approved automatically. I'm not familiar with Blogger's functions and was not aware that only one of the many estimable contributors here were authorized to edit comments, so if the staff has judged that open commenting is best for those reasons, I will withdraw my statement.
ReplyDeleteWhile we are discussing links, the link for Empire Club of Canada in Imperial Loyalists is broken http://www.empireclub.org/ leads to their site.
ReplyDeleteGetting away from technical matters, I believe that we should not rest on our laurels but instead come up with some new campaign of "creeping monarchism" to further strengthen the institution in Canada.
A very long time in coming ! Now, if we can just get Pips and Crowns Rank Insignia back and rebuild the lost regiments of the Great War ... God Save the Queen.
ReplyDelete