Fifty-One is Better than Forty-Nine

Democracy and Autocracy

When Queen Elizabeth was 'gathered to her fathers', I voiced my concerns to an American friend: 'Charles may have problems keeping his mouth shut', I said. I was alluding to the best-known constitutional mandate, namely, that our monarch may not trespass on political territory. Charles, as heir apparent, had 'form' for testing political ice, albeit gingerly so. My friend, however, preferred to parade his American disdain for our antediluvian constitution, in which the head of state is born, and not - as with modern, enlightened, sophisticated peoples - elected.

The belief that our royal family is only a vestigial organ, descended from primitive ancestors and excisable with no danger to the body politic, is, it seems to me, desperately naïve. Rather, the royal family are baked into our national identity. We may as well remove the flour from a loaf of bread.

Our constitution is admittedly somewhat ramshackle. This is inevitable: it evolved slowly and incrementally over many centuries. Yet the peace and stability it provides can only be dreamed of in many republics. In software engineering there is the 'kludge' - a configuration that is inelegant, inefficient, clumsy, and patched together; but it works. Shall we rip our constitution up, and start again with a blank sheet of paper, simply because it is a ramshackle, archaic affair? I suspect we would be quickly undeceived.

The historically minded will know that England has, in fact, already been a republic - for eleven years. The results were not encouraging. Parliament oppressed the people; the army overawed parliament. Several constitutions were tried, none of which worked. The monarchy was eventually re-instated.

The Americans like to adduce their political stability to their neat-and-tidy constitution. But Liberia has virtually the same constitution as the US, with rather different results. This is because many factors contribute to a stable and prosperous polity. I think the monarchy is best left alone. I suspect the ceiling would come down. I realise, however, that the 'kludge' argument and the 'law of unintended consequences' are only arguing from the negative standpoint.

Another problem, then, is that elected heads of state are political figures; and political figures are inevitably divisive figures. A president cannot, like a monarch, be a figure of unity; an umbrella for the nation; an embodiment of the nation; a locus of national feeling untainted by partisan politics. When antimonarchists bloviate, be sure to ask them if they'd be happy with a President Blair or a President Thatcher. Then tell them to be careful what they ask for. Today's USA looks politically rather fragile to me. The two sides, the Republicans and Democrats, hate each other's guts; they shout insults across an unbridgeable gulf. But the president must be one or t'other. When one considers President Trump and President Biden, the word 'unifying' does not come readily to mind.

The Americans believe that 'England', by which they mean the United Kingdom, is governed by a handful of titled gentlemen - Dukes, Barons, Earls, Viscounts, etc., - readily identifiable by their top hats, winged collars, frock coats and liveried chauffeurs. These 'aristocrats' enjoy great power and wealth, gained, not by effort, but by birth; and that is wrong. Privilege, which is 'gaining unfair advantage', is antithetical to merit, or succeeding by hard work. This is to consider one side of the coin only. Privilege is inimical to society, but only when divorced from responsibility, as Peregrine Worsthorne argues in In Defence of Aristocracy. This is not the comedic world of Dad's Army, in which Captain Mainwaring grabs the best bunk, and the rest of the men have to fend for themselves. It is the real world of John Glub or Edmund Blunden, in which the commanding officer has no opportunity for rest, until the needs of his men are properly catered for.

As for our monarch's responsibilities, anti-monarchists are divided. Most of them, the shallower variety, believe the monarch has no real power; when not serving as our nation's biggest tourist attraction, he merely rubber-stamps legislation enacted by parliament. A few anti-monarchists, the deeper sort, believe the monarch has too much power. This is because the monarch can remove a Prime Minister from office, irrespective of the wishes of parliament. This power has never been invoked; but it exists in principle.

The British, contrary to common perception, may rid themselves of the monarchy, and convert their country into a republic whenever they like. The government need only draft the legislation, then have it passed by parliament. The stumbling block, is that such a policy would have to appear in an election manifesto, and such a manifesto would not win an election. In a constitutional monarchy, the monarchy exists by the will of the people.

The Americans, who confuse constitutional monarchies with absolute monarchies, believe that our monarch can, say, on conceiving a mild dislike for the butler, simply shout 'Off with his head!'; and thereon have the hapless menial dispatched on Tower Hill. The US president, however, can make law unilaterally by 'executive order'; this is American-speak for 'decree', which is the way absolute monarchs make law. In the British polity, no single individual has any such power, not even the monarch. In this respect the British have a constitutional republic, and the Americans have an absolute monarchy. Just sayin'.

Returning to privilege without responsibility, this is everywhere: I refer to 'celebrities'. Film stars, rock musicians, sportsmen and the like - but chiefly actors, for some reason - grab the attention of the mass media, which is where their privilege lies; they then tell us what must be done, which is where their irresponsibility lies. Joanna Lumley demanded better pensions for the Gurkhas; but she herself does not have to find this money, nor endure the opprobrium of taking it away from others. Gary Linneker tells us to embrace mass immigration; but immigrants will not put him out of work; they will not stop him obtaining a doctor's appointment; and they will not convert his leafy suburb into a shanty-town. Hollywood is the world capital of luxury beliefs, in which great privilege is enjoyed without a smidgeon of responsibility.

Let us examine the principle of democracy: one hundred voters must choose a leader, 'X' and 'Y'. Well, fifty-one say 'X'; forty-nine say 'Y'. This decision is easily enough arrived at, on a democratic basis. But if we elect a leader, will we get the best leader? Politics is one of the few areas of life - perhaps the only one - where persons of inexperience and inability can rise rapidly to positions of power and influence. Why was David Lammy our foreign secretary? He believes that men can grow a cervix, and that Henry VII succeeded Henry VIII. Why was Dianne Abbot the Shadow Home Secretary? Her word-salads and mental arithmetic are well-known. A corporal if he stays in the army may never rise further than sergeant; but if he enters politics, he may end up telling the generals what to do. We prefer to believe that Hitler maintained his position by brutality, but that was only after he got established. And he got established because he had charisma; because of his electrifying speeches. Hitler was an elected leader.

Churchill's mode of ascent is also largely forgotten. In those days the Conservative party had no leadership election, as today. Instead, Tory grandees sat in their wood-panelled rooms, smoked their cigars, sipped their brandies, and talked amongst themselves. And in July 1940, they decided to give Winston Churchill a chance. If the Conservative party had voted, Charles Wood would have been Prime Minister. This man was an appeaser who planned not to fight, but to sign a negotiated peace with Hitler. Imagine that. Democracy was saved by a leader appointed nondemocratically. And it was saved from a despot who was elected.

The war was almost lost, because, throughout the 1930s, re-armament was unpopular. In general elections, the British indirectly voted for the destruction of the system that gave them the vote. If a political candidate tells us things we do not like, things we do not want to hear, will we vote for him? This explains why democracy is considered inadvisable in some walks of life. Workers do not vote for their managers; soldiers do not vote for their officers. I have heard an army officer say: 'soldiers always recognise a good officer'. But if this is the case, then why not democratise the army?

Jess Philips, Member of Parliament for Birmingham Yardley, is a feminist with the usual screed: that men are responsible for all the world's ills: that women live in perpetual fear of men: that women are sexually abused and harassed at every turn: that we live in a rape culture. But, mention the industrial-scale rape of under-aged girls by grooming gangs, and she can scarcely be induced to talk. The explanation lies in the demography of her marginal constituency. Our representatives are, after all, answerable to the people who elect them. We cannot, therefore, complain if our leaders put 'getting elected' first; and 'getting re-elected' second. At best, 'doing the right thing' comes in a poor third.

These are the things I think about, when antimonarchists bloviate about the monarchy.

Bibliography

Monarchy Matters, Peter Whittle, The Social Affairs Unit (2011).

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