Royal weddings are a chance for everyone to have a party. Arch-monarchists can take to the streets (that’s to say, they can throw street parties), wave their little flags and swear undying loyalty to the Queen and her offspring. Fierce republicans can counter with anti-parties in which the television coverage from Westminster Abbey is switched off and the toasts are drunk to Oliver Cromwell. As my old colleague, Peter Snow, would put it: 'it’s all just a bit of fun!'
Inevitably, though, the mere fact that the country has paid attention to little else over the past few days means that questions will get raised. Should we stay with the monarchy just as it is, or do we need to make some changes?
Some of these questions are fundamental, some less so. Among the gentler ones being posed at the moment is what should happen if and when William and Kate have their first child. If it is a boy, he will be next in line to the throne after his grandfather, Prince Charles, and his father, Prince William. But if it is a girl, she will have to take her turn not only behind any brothers born after her but also behind any nephews and nieces subsequently born to them. Reformers argue that this rule of male primogeniture is outdated in a feminist world and should be changed. Succession should pass to the eldest child, irrespective of what sex it is.
There are a few people who argue against this on strict traditionalist lines or even on anti-feminist ones. But the main obstacle could be a practical rather than a principled one. The British monarch is the head of state not just of the United Kingdom but of a dozen or so other countries within the Commonwealth. Those countries would have to agree to any change in the law of succession and some supporters of the monarchy are worried that any attempt to make such a change would stir up controversy about the future of the monarchy itself. In particular republican feeling in Australia could be set alight simply by raising the issue.
It has been reported that Nick Clegg, the Deputy Prime Minister, is interested in pursuing this option within a wider package of constitutional reform he intends to introduce later this year. No doubt before he does so he will be taking soundings in Australia where republicans may be looking for an opportunity to hold another referendum on the monarchy, having failed to get rid of it in the last one.
No government minister is on the record as supporting a more radical break with tradition that is being canvassed in some parts of the popular press. It is not to get rid of the monarchy but to skip a generation when the Queen dies. The idea that William not Charles should become the next king is being floated by those who think the monarchy needs an injection of youth which the Prince of Wales, at 62, is now too old to provide. Some people also think that he has meddled so much in politics, publicly expressing his views or privately lobbying ministers on many issues, that he has disqualified himself from a role in which dispassionate impartiality is essential.
Prince Charles’s defenders say that he has aired his views no more nor less than many of his predecessors and that, in any case, if he had failed to express views on anything, he would have been accused of indifference and of not caring for what was going on in the world around him.
The main objection, however, to skipping a generation is that it contradicts the whole point of the monarchy, which is that succession is determined simply by birth and not by choice. Whether Prince Charles is or is not the best choice to be the next monarch is irrelevant: the system puts him next in line and that’s all there is to be said about it.
Except, that is, for republicans. Their fundamental objection is precisely that in a democracy a head of state, like any other major public figure, should be elected rather than assume the role simply by virtue of birth. Furthermore, the monarchy’s very existence condones privilege and helps perpetuate a class system which, they argue, perniciously permeates the whole of British society. Get rid of the monarchy and that whole system would come crashing down.
It is as familiar an argument as the monarchist defence. That says that we should keep the monarchy because we have always had it. Its very endurance has been the foundation of our country’s peace and stability in a fast-changing world. It doesn’t much matter that the head of state is not elected because in this country the head of state has little power.
What’s more, in a period when politicians are held in such low esteem, it is a good thing that the head of state is not one. And, say the monarchists, just ponder who we might get as president if we became a republic and we elected the head of state – either some second-rate politician or, even worse, some celebrity no one had respect for.
These questions were not likely to be resolved over this holiday weekend when those who were interested in such things were talking much more about Kate's dress, or where the couple are off to for their honeymoon. Nor is the fundamental question of the future of the monarchy likely to be seriously addressed until the long reign of the Queen finally comes to an end. But it is highly likely that at some point in the future this newly-married couple will find themselves at the centre of such a controversy.
What’s your view?
- Did you celebrate the wedding, putting on an anti-monarchy party or just ignoring the whole thing?
- Do you think the wedding was good for us all or do you think there was too much fuss about it?
- Should constitutional law be changed so that William and Kate’s eldest child, rather than their eldest son, should eventually succeed their father to the throne?
- What do you make of the suggestion that the monarchy should skip a generation with Prince William rather Prince Charles succeeding the Queen?
- And on the fundamental issue, do you think Britain should go on being a monarchy or should become a republic?
