British Studies > The Monarchy > Flashcards
The Monarchy Flashcards
The position of the monarch in Britain is a perfect illustration of the
contradictory nature of the constitution
From the evidence of , the … King/Queen/ has …, and it all seems …
written law only … almost absolute power … very undemocratic
The American constitution talks about
“government of the people for the people by the people”
In fact, there is no legal concept of …in the government at all.
“the people”
Every autumn, at the state opening of the Parliament, Elizabeth II, who became queen in 1952, made a speech. In it she said what
“my government” intended to do in the coming year
And indeed it was … government, ….
her…not the people’s
As far as the law is concerned, the queen/king could choose anybody ….
he/she liked to run the government for him/her
There are no restrictions on whom they pick as her …
Prime Minister
It does not have to be somebody who …
has been elected
Officially speaking, they(the ministers and so on) are all …
“servants of the Crown” (not servants of anything like “the country” or “the people”)
And if he/she got fed up with her ministers, he/she could just …
dismiss them
The monarch also appears to have great power over …
Parliament
It is the monarch who … a Parliament, and who … it before general election
summons … dissolves
Other countries have “citizens”. But in Britain people are legally described as …
“subjects”- subjects of His/Her Majesty the King/Queen.
Nothing that Parliament had decided could become law until the monarch ….
has agreed to it
In the USA when the police take someone to court to accuse them of a crime, the court records show that …
“the people” have accused that person. In other countries it might be “the state” that makes the accusation. But in Britain it is “the Crown”. This is because of the legal authority of the monarch
Similarly, it is the Queen/King and not any other figure of authority, who …
embodies the law in the courts
And when an accused person is found guilty of a crime, he or she might be sent to …
one of “his/her Majesty’s” prisons.
Moreover, there is a principle of English law that the monarch can do nothing that is …
legally wrong. In other words, The King/ Queen is above the law.
In fact, the King/Queen cannot choose …
anyone they like to be Prime Minister.
This is because the law says that “his/her” government can only collect taxes with the …
agreement of the Commons, so if he/she did not choose such a person, the government would stop functioning.
He/She has to choose someone who has the support of the majority of …
MPs in the House of Commons (the elected chamber of the two Houses of Parliament).
In practice the person he/she chooses is the …
leader of the strongest party in the House of Commons.
Similarly, it is really the Prime Minister who decides …
who the other government ministers are going to be (although officially the Prime Minister simply “advises the Monarch who to choose)
It is the same story with the Parliament. Again the Prime Minister will talk about ….
“requesting “ a dissolution of Parliament when he/ she wants to hold an election, but it would normally be impossible for the monarch to refuse this “request”.
Similarly, while, in theory,the King/Queen could refuse the royal assent to a bill passed by Parliament - and so stop it becoming law- no monarch has actually done so since …
the year 1708(Queen Anne refused to assent to the Scottish Militia Bill, the last time the royal veto was used. The Treaty of Utrecht ended the War of the Spanish Succession.)
Indeed the royal assent is so automatic that the King/Queen doesn’t … .
even bother to give it in person. Somebody else signs the document for him/her
In reality the King/Queen has almost no power at all. When the Queen opened the Parliament each year the speech she made had been …
written for her. She made no secret of this fact. She very obviously read out the script that had been prepared for her word for word. If she strongly disagreed with one of the policies of the government, she might ask the government ministers to change the wording in the speech a little beforehand, but that was all. She could not actually stop the government going ahead with any of its policies.
The Role of the Monarch 1
First, the monarch is the personal embodiment of the government of the country. This means that people can be as critical as they like about the real government, and can argue that it should be thrown out, without being accused of being unpatriotic. Because of the clear separation between the symbol of government (the King/Queen) and the actual government (the ministers, who are also MPs), changing the government does not threaten the stability of the country as a whole. Other countries without a monarch have to use something else as the symbol of the country. In the USA, for example, one of these is its flag, and to damage the flag in any way is actually a criminal offense.
The Role of the Monarch 3
Third, the Monarch has a very practical role to play. By being a figurehead and representing the country, the King/Queen can perform the ceremonial duties which heads of state often have to spend their time on. This way, the real government has more time to get on with the actual job of running the country.
The Role of the Monarch 2
Second, it is argued that the monarch could act as a final check on a government that was becoming dictatorial. If the government ever managed to pass a bill through Parliament which was obviously terribly bad and very unpopular, the monarch could refuse the royal assent and the bill would not become law. Similarly, it is possible that if a Prime Minister who had been defeated at a general election (and so no longer commanded a majority in the House of Commons) were to ask immediately for another dissolution of Parliament (so that another election could take place), the monarch could refuse the request and dismiss the Prime Minister.
The Value of the Monarchy
However, all these advantages are hypothetical. It cannot be proved that only a monarch can provide them. Other modern democracies manage perfectly well without one. The British monarchy is probably more important to the economy of the country than it is to the system of government. Apart from this, the monarchy is very popular with the majority of the British people. The monarch gives British people a symbol of continuity, and a harmless outlet for the expression of national pride. Even in very hard times it has never seemed likely that Britain would turn to a dictator to get it out of its trouble. The grandeur of its monarchy may have been one of the reasons for this.
Occasions such as the state opening of Parliament, the queen’s official birthday, royal weddings, and ceremonial events, such as “changing of the guard” make up for the lack of colour and ceremony in most people’s daily lives. (There is no tradition of local parades as there is in the USA, and very few traditional local festivals survive as they do in other European countries). In addition, the glamorous lives of “the royals” provide a source of entertainment that often takes on the characteristics of a television soap opera. When in 1992 it became known that Prince Charles and his wife Princess Diana were separating, even the more “serious” newspapers discussed a lot more than the possible political implications. The Sunday Times published a “five-page royal separation special”.
The Future of the Monarchy
For the last 250 years the British monarchy as an institution has only rarely been a burning political issue. Only occasionally has there been debate about the existence of the monarchy itself. Few people in Britain could be described as either “monarchists” or “anti-monarchists”, in the sense in which these terms are often used in other countries. Most people are either vaguely in favour or they just don’t care one way or the other. There is, however, a great deal of debate about what kind of monarchy Britain should have. During the last two decades of the XX century there has been a general cooling of enthusiasm. The Queen herself remained popular. But the various marital problems in the royal family have lowered the prestige of royalty in many people’s eyes. The problem is that, since Queen Victoria’s reign, the public have been encouraged to look up to the royal family as a model of Christian family life.
The change in attitude can be seen by comparing Queen Elizabeth’s 25th anniversary as Queen with her 40th anniversary. In 1977 there were neighbourhood street parties throughout the country, most of them spontaneously and voluntarily organized. But in 1992 nothing like this took place. On 20th November 1992 a fire damaged one of the Queen’s favourite homes to the value of 60 million. There were expressions of public sympathy for the Queen. But when the government announced that public money was going to pay for the repairs, the sympathy quickly turned to anger. The Queen had recently been reported to be the richest woman in the world, so people didn’t see why she shouldn’t pay for them herself.
It is, in fact, on the subject of money that “anti-royalist” opinions are most often expressed. In the early nineties even some Conservative MPs, traditionally strong supporters of the monarchy, started protesting at how much the royal family was costing the country. For the whole of her long reign Elizabeth II had been exempt from taxation. But, as a response to the change in attitude, The Queen decided that she would start paying taxes on her private income. In addition, Civil List payments to some members of the royal family were stopped. (The Civil List is the money which the Queen and some of her relatives get from Parliament each year so that they can carry out their public duties).
For most people the most notable event marking Queen Elizabeth’s 40th anniversary was a television programme about a year in her life which showed revealing details of her private family life. In the following year parts of Buckingham Palace were, for the first time, opened for public visits (to raise money to help pay for the repairs to Windsor Castle). These events are perhaps an indication of the future royal style- a little less grand, a little less distant.
Queen Elizabeth II marked her Platinum Jubilee, celebrating 70 years on the throne, with a four-day Bank Holiday weekend from Thursday, 2 June to Sunday, 5 June, 2022. The events marked the Queen’s 70-year reign, a milestone she reached on 6 February 2022 - becoming the first British Monarch to do so.As with the Queen’s Golden and Diamond Jubilees,the first week in June has been chosen for the celebratory weekend,with the summer offering a better chance of good weather than February.
Timeline of the British (English) Monarchs
1.The Normans (1066-1154) / Plantagenets (1154-1399) / The House of Lancaster (1399-1461)/ The House of York (1461-1485)/ The Tudors (1485-1603) / The Stuarts (1603-1649, 1660-1714) / The House of Hanoverians (1714-1901) / Saxe-Coburg-Gotha and The Windsors (1901- today)
The House of Windsor
Windsor is the family name of the royal family. The press sometimes refers to its members as “the Windsors”. King Charles III is only the 5th monarch with this name. This is not because a “new” royal name took over the throne of Britain 4 reigns ago. It is because George V, Charles III’s great- grandfather , changed the family name. It was Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, but during World War I it was thought better for the king not to have a German-sounding name.
Honours
Twice a year an Honours List is published. The people whose names appear on the list are then summoned to Buckingham Palace where the Monarch presents them with a token which enables them to write (and be formally addressed with) KG, or KCB, CBE and many other combinations of letters after their names. The letters stand for titles such as “Knight of the Order of the Garter”, “Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath”, “Commander of the British Empire” and so on. Life peerages are also awarded, which entitle the recipients to a seat in the House of Lords.
Traditionally, it was by giving people titles such as these that the monarch “honoured” them in return for their services. These days, the decision about who gets which honour is usually taken by the Prime Minister And, as you can see, the names of the titles don’t seem to make much sense in modern times. But that does not stop people finding it a real “honour” to be given a title by the monarch herself! A high proportion of honours are given to politicians and civil servants, but they are also given to business people, sports stars, rock musicians and other entertainers.
The Economic Argument
Every tourist brochure for Britain in every country of the world gives great prominence to the monarchy. It is impossible to estimate exactly how much the British Royal family and the events and buildings associated with the monarchy help the tourist industry, or exactly how much money they help to bring to the country. But most people working in tourism think it is an awful lot!
The line of succession to the British Throne after King Charles III.
(1)William, Prince of Wales (b. 1982) (elder son of Charles III)
(2) Prince George of Wales (b. 2013)
(3) Princess Charlotte of Wales (b. 2015)
(4)Prince Louis of Wales (b. 2018)
(5) Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex (b. 1984) (younger son of Charles III)
(6) Archie Mountbatten-Windsor (b. 2019)
(7) Lilibet Mountbatten-Windsor (b. 2021)
(8) Prince Andrew, Duke of York (b. 1960) (younger brother of Charles III)
(9) Princess Beatrice (b. 1988)
(10) Sienna Mapelli Mozzi (b. 2021)
(11) Princess Eugenie (b. 1990)
(12) August Brooksbank (b. 2021) B D
(13) Prince Edward, Earl of Wessex and Forfar (b. 1964) (youngest brother of Charles III)
(14) James Mountbatten-Windsor, Viscount Severn (b. 2007)
(15) Lady Louise Mountbatten-Windsor (b. 2003)
(16) Anne, Princess Royal (b. 1950) (sister of Charles III)
(17) Peter Phillips (b. 1977)
(18) Savannah Phillips (b. 2010)
(19) Isla Phillips (b. 2012)
(20) Zara Tindall (née Phillips; b. 1981)
(21) Mia Tindall (b. 2014)
(22) Lena Tindall (b. 2018)
(23) Lucas Tindall (b. 2021)
Edward and Mrs Simpson
For the last two centuries the public have wanted their monarch to have high moral standards. In 1936 Edward VIII, the uncle of the present Queen, was forced to abdicate (give up the throne). This happened because he wanted to marry a woman who had divorced two husbands . (On top of that, she was not even a British aristocrat- she was an American!)The government and the major churches in the country insisted that Edward could not marry her and remain king. He chose to marry her. The couple then went to live abroad. In spite of the constitutional crisis that it caused, the Duke of Windsor (as Edward later became)and his wife were popular celebrities in Britain all their lives and the king’s abdication has gone down in popular history as an example of the power of love.
More facts about King Charles III
Charles III was born 14 November 1948 in Buckingham Palace. His full name is Charles Philip Arthur George Windsor. His mother was Queen Elizabeth II and his father was Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh. Charles became King of the United Kingdom and 14 other Commonwealth realms on 8 September 2022 upon the death of his mother, Elizabeth II. Aged 73, King Charles III is the oldest monarch ever crowned in British history, having been heir apparent (the next person to be crowned) since he was 3 years old. Charles was officially proclaimed King on Saturday 10 September 2022 at St James’s Palace in London. This happened in front of a ceremonial body known as the Accession Council. When he became king, Charles gave up his title, ‘The Prince of Wales’. This title was passed on to his oldest son, William. Charles is married to Camilla Parker Bowles. When he became king she became queen consort. They first met at a polo match in 1970 and had been involved romantically until the then Prince left to serve in the Royal Navy. Charles’ first marriage was to Lady Diana Spencer. They were married in 1981 and had two children: William and Henry (known as “Harry”). The couple separated and later divorced in 1996. Sadly, Diana was killed in a car crash in Paris just one year later.
