Subscribe to RSS feed
Evan Harris MP’s Private Member’s Bill, which would lift the ban on anyone in the line of succession marrying a Roman Catholic, will be voted on in the Commons today.
The Bill would also would also amend the primogeniture rules, which state the first-born son of the monarch takes precedence in the succession over older sisters.
Republic’s line on this is very clear: while we welcome any debate on the monarchy, the real issue is that the it discriminates against us all, not just Catholics and women in the Windsor family.
It’s entirely right to rid our constitution of sectarian language, as Dr Harris puts it, but a monarchy without discrimination just isn’t a monarchy any more.
And it’s for that reason that we welcome this opportunity to debate the real issues. When you start using the language of rights, equality and justice to talk about the monarchy, it begins to unravel.
We start to see what’s really going on – a grubby pact between politicians clinging to the almost limitless power of the Crown and the Windsor family protecting their taxpayer-funded life of luxury.
As arch-monarchist Andrew Roberts put it the last time the Act of Settlement made the headlines, “as soon as one attempts to apply today’s standards to it [the monarchy] – especially modern human-rights legislation – one undermines its strongest reason for existence.”
So of course these proposals are pointless, and Gordon Brown has no intention of seeing them pass. But this is a golden opportunity to expose the monarchy for what it is – an absurd and harmful institution which discriminates against us all.
Update
Monarchist Steve Doughty at The Daily Mail says:
But the trouble with pulling down pillars of the constitution is that you never know what may fall with them.
Tinkering with either the 18th century law or the principle of primogeniture would put a question mark over the future of the monarchy, at a time when its popularity has been rocky.
[...]
An end to primogeniture would be seen as a blow to the hereditary principle, already eroded by the removal of hereditary peers from the House of Lords.
Tags: act of settlement, catholics, evan harris, primogeniture
March 27th, 2009 at 10:41 am
This is an absolute absurdity. The opinions of the likes of Andrew Roberts are genuinely scary. He says: ‘It is precisely because [the institution of monarchy] is so magnificently atavistic, archaic and irrational – so unlike anything else in society – that it exercises such power over the human imagination, connecting us directly to our Saxon past.’ The Saxon past?! What is he on?!
We can’t let opinions like this dominate the debate. Every one of us that is sickened by the continued existence of this revoltingly discriminatory institution needs to get involved in the campaign and fight for a truly modern system of governance. These reforms are an attempt to make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear. Monarchy is broken – it is an anachronism and symbolises everything that we have moved on from. Time for change.
March 27th, 2009 at 11:03 am
This is like putting a plaster on something that should be put down. The monarchy is pointless and needs to be abolished.
March 27th, 2009 at 11:09 am
Well put and it seems that we are in full agreement as in my own blog of today.
Let’s remember that if fairness and democracy actually did win through then the Queen or any of her family would be entitled to stand for election too. Then all those who believe that the Queen is so good for us could vote for Elizabeth Windsor and if elected could serve for five years, or whatever, as head of state. That’s fair, that’s democracy.
March 27th, 2009 at 11:27 am
pointless family lets just get rid of them.
March 27th, 2009 at 12:46 pm
I agree that the monarchy is an ‘absurd and harmful’ intstitution that descriminates against us all. It is totally undemocratic, sits on vast wealth and land that rightfully belong to the people and to tinker around at the edges of this Medieval institution is absurd.
Please, Gordon, as you seem to be so concerned with democracy and consulting the people on constitutional reform, could we have a refendum on how many of us would prefer an elected Head of State ? They’re talking about it in Australia. Why is such discussion so carefully blocked over here ?
A Labour Prime Minister would consider this.
March 27th, 2009 at 1:37 pm
Well its about time this ancient and unjust throwback to the feudal system had a reality check. I hope this ignites the whole question of even having to suffer and maintain such a undemocratic institution!
March 27th, 2009 at 2:01 pm
That Greek guy suposedly said: Cowell is a sponger: how many years has he been SPONGING!!!!!b off us FAR FARV FAR too long same as all the 500+ nad counting in line to the throne Up The Republic
March 27th, 2009 at 2:17 pm
“… I think in the 21st Century people do expect discrimination to be removed and they do expect us to be looking at all these issues.” This is a quote on the BBC website from Gordon Brown.
Unfortunately, he is not talking about the discrimination that is in place to stop all but a select handful of people from ever becoming our Head of State. Surely, in the 21st Century, the concept of a monarchy should be seen as silly and extremely old fashioned, never mind unfair an undemocratic.
March 27th, 2009 at 2:27 pm
The monarchy as a modern political system is fundamentally undemocratic by definition. This amendment is less about discrimination against Catholics or women within the Royal Family than it should be about discrimination against every CITIZEN of Britain.
Graham,
I listened to your comments on the BBC News this morning. Well done for bringing such balanced and articulate views to the public forum. Thank you!
In following up on your example, I telephoned in to the BBC Radio Essex programme on the subject and stated my support for and memebership in Republic on the very straightforward premise that the monarchy is a fundamentally undemocratic system predicated upon the backs of those it would seek to exclude.
March 27th, 2009 at 2:38 pm
The most self-damning line in the Daily Mail’s defence of the monarchy is the admission on their front page that the Queen’s consent had to be sought and granted for the Commons debate to take place at all ! Some democracy !
March 27th, 2009 at 3:03 pm
The monarchy is a fundamentally undemocratic institution concentrating wealth, privilege, influence, power and authority in one family as an accident of birth predicated upon the backs of those it seeks to both EXCLUDE AND EXPLOIT.
Have we so lost our sense of FAIRNESS and become so confused in our notions of SOCIAL JUSTICE that we are willing to accept such a system in place of a REAL DEMOCRACY representative of and accountable to the people who elect it?
As to the idea that people ‘LIKE’ the present monarch… good grief, the media also informs us that lots of people like heroine, lots of people like junk food, lots of people like prostitution. Does that mean they’re GOOD??? Does that mean it’s beneficial to our society, our democracy, our families, our education, our working lives? That some monarchist-biased BBC poll publishes the idea that some people LIKE the Queen has nothing to do with the real issue: that in a functioning democracy, PEOPLE HAVE THE RIGHT AND DUTY TO ELECT THEIR REPRESENTATIVES AND TO HOLD THEM ACCOUNTABLE IN THE PUBLIC TRUST.
March 27th, 2009 at 3:11 pm
“God save our gracious queen”: as a republican and an atheist, the monarchy discriminates against me on both counts. It is of no matter to me whether the monarch is C of E, Catholic, Muslim, or a disciple of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. What does matter to me is that ultimate political power in this country lies with an unelected, unaccountable, unrepresentative monarchy whose only role is its own self-preservation.
We must stop deluding ourselves that we live in a democracy in this country. We don’t. The governments of Australia and New Zealand are actively taking steps to dissociate themselves from the House of Windsor. We should follow their example.
March 27th, 2009 at 3:16 pm
Succession is not the issue. John Milton wrote in 1649 that kings [sic] should be chosen by the people; their power being no more than what is derived, transferred and committed to them in trust from the people, to the common good of them all. It follows (said Milton) that since the king holds his authority of the people and not his own, then may the public as often reject him, retain him or depose him. Thus the power of kings was and is originally vested in the people, with liberty and right remaining with them to reassume it for themselves.
Now that would be real modernisation.
March 27th, 2009 at 3:19 pm
When I lived in Dublin, I had the pleasure of working on Mary Robinson’s presidential campaign.
Mary was thought by the Irish political establishment not to have a snowball-in-hell’s chance of becoming Head of State. Firstly, she was a member of one of the 2 main political parties (Fianna Fail and Fine Gael) and secondly, she was a woman. No woman and no one outside the 2 main parties had ever been elected President of Ireland – the job was sown up.
The pundits and the political elite reckoned without the citizens. Mary scored a stunning victory and went on to serve a second term, acclaimed at home and abroad as Ireland’s best ever president. Now Ireland has a second female president, Mary McAleese – and she’s not even from the Republic, but from Belfast !
If there ever was a lesson in ‘people power’, this is it. Things do NOT have to go on as they always did. Moulds CAN be broken. Fresh starts CAN be made. Think it, act on it and it CAN happen.
March 27th, 2009 at 3:22 pm
Correction _
The above should read : Mary was NOT a member of one of the 2 main political parties.
March 27th, 2009 at 4:41 pm
And even to this very day the Monarchy is still being used in Northern Ireland to fester division among differing Christian denominations :
DUP accused regarding royal marriage reforms stance Print Email+ Share+ 27/03/2009 – 12:52:29
The Democratic Unionist Party was today accused of using 16th-century propaganda to oppose plans to allow heirs to the British throne to marry Catholics.
After Prime Minister Gordon Brown said he was determined to end the discrimination in the 1701 Act of Settlement, DUP junior minister Jeffrey Donaldson opposed the plan and claimed Catholics owed their first allegiance to the Vatican.
But today the nationalist SDLP accused Mr Donaldson – whose role in the power-sharing government at Stormont includes promoting community relations – of repeating tribal myths.
Mr Donaldson said he was defending legislation that was key to the monarch’s constitutional position.
But SDLP deputy leader Alasdair McDonnell said: “Jeffrey should learn some proper history and drop the tribal mythology.
“Catholics owe no political or constitutional allegiance to the Pope or to the Vatican State and they never have.
“This was the lie that was used to attempt to justify the Penal Laws and the legal definition of Irish Catholics as Papists, terminology that leading DUP members have only dropped in recent times.”
The South Belfast MP said the allegations that Catholics had divided loyalties was “poisonous 16th century propaganda”.
But Mr Donaldson defended his comments and said changes to the law could cause constitutional difficulties.
He said: “A potential monarch who would be a Roman Catholic and a member of that Church is required to owe their first allegiance to the Vatican.”
Mr Donaldson added: “There is therefore a potential conflict of interest.”
The Lagan Valley MP said: “Alasdair McDonnell should check his facts before he makes these kind of comments.”
He said the SDLP could help boost community relations by asking the Vatican to overturn claims that Catholicism is the only true Christian Church and recognise the status of other Christian denominations.
He told Mr McDonnell: “That would be a useful step rather than tampering with legislation that protects the constitutional position of the country.”
http://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/eyaueymhaumh
March 27th, 2009 at 6:23 pm
Isn’t the whole Evan Harris debate simply a way to prolong the whole corrupt set up? Lets get rid of these feudal throwbacks entirely. Charlie and horse features should be sent packing.
March 27th, 2009 at 7:44 pm
I was impressed by the pride felt by so many Americans that their country had in Barack Obamam democratically elected a Head of State who offered new hope and leadership to their country . This is something we can never, under our present system of Monarchy, experience in this country. We have a Head of State who is accountable to no one and who, in the worst traditions of nepotism, inherits his/her position purely on the basis of birth and class. Let’s do away with it as soon as possible and join other democracies as a a republic in the 21st century.
March 28th, 2009 at 3:59 pm
Lets remember that though many people have said that the monarchy is a pointless institution, as it is of course, this is not the true issue. The real issue lies in the fact that the existance of the monarchy is itself wrong. A concept that is rotten at the core; it reeks of inequality and hateful prejudice. An attempt to modernise the monarchy is inhuman purely for the reason that it is a way to present this hereditary discrimination as a new and cosmopolitan form of governance.
March 28th, 2009 at 4:13 pm
Thanks for all your comments. It seems you are all supportive of Republic’s stance on the issue, which is really good to know.
Sam – absolutely right. If the monarchy was just pointless, it wouldn’t be a problem. The truth is it’s pointless and extremely damaging – to our democracy and to our sense of aspiration and responsibility.
March 30th, 2009 at 9:12 pm
I just love it when people monarchists cite history as if it justifies its existence. One of the main reasons why the English monarchy was so anti-Catholic was that they were always thought of as being associated with England’s 2 main Catholic European enemies, namely France and Spain. Hasn’t that threat somewhat dissipated now – along with the reasons behind their discrimination?
It is also worth reminding them that the title ‘Defender of the Faith’, which successive monarchs seems so proud of, was bestowed upon Henry viii BY THE POPE in recognition of his outspoken opposition to Martin Luther. Is it just me or is the title a total misnomer?
March 31st, 2009 at 2:10 pm
I often hear the most staunch monarchists debating “who should succeed Quen Elizabeth?”, “Is Charles fit to govern? (sic)”, “We want William as our next King”……etc.
These monarchists get very angry when I point out to them that they are really having a debate to CHOOSE their next head of state……Aren’t they therefore really frustrated republicans!