If the different definitions of democracy take a good deal of unraveling (see my earlier post), the problems associated with monarchy are hardly less troubling.
As a tradition-oriented Englishman, it seems to be almost a tribal necessity that my sympathies are with Monarchy as distinct from the English form or Republicanism, the latter of which is normally nothing but a manifestation of mean-spirited class warfare, rooted in a dog-in-the-manger mentality. It is not far from the truth to say that the only Englishmen who desire the abolition of the Monarchy are socialists of one hue or another, ranging from effeminate pink to bloody red.
And yet for a Catholic Englishman who understands the history of his country it is not easy to support the present monarchy. The true king of England, James II, was deposed in a revolution that the revolutionaries and their heirs have called “glorious” but which was, in fact, an unholy alliance between a foreign power, Protestant anti-popery and mercantile self-interest. Ever since the successful invasion of England by a foreign army in that “Glorious” Revolution in 1688, the True King has been in exile, a fact that served as imaginative grist to the mill of Tolkien’s fertile Catholic imagination. Minas Tirith, like England, is ruled by stewards who are keeping the throne warm until the long-awaited Return of the King. Queen Elizabeth is not the true queen of England but a steward who keeps the throne warm in the absence of the True King. That being said, I’d rather have the throne being kept warm by a woman who has devoted her life to her duties self-sacrificially than have it empty or, worse, have an elected politician squatting on it.
I’ll end these musings with a provocative comparison between Monarchy and the modern secular form of Macro-Democracy: The weakness of Monarchy is that the government is as good or bad as the monarch. In practice, this means that Monarchy tends to be bad government, with only occasional periods of good government in between. This differs from modern secular Macro-Democracy, which guarantees bad government all the time!
It was Froude who pointed out that if England had been a democracy at the time of the Reformation, it would have remained a Catholic country. Same goes for Europe. Without a top-down implementation, the Reformation would never have got off the ground. No monarch, no Reformation.
To Joseph Pearce:
I would have thought that it is as important to distinguish between types of Monarchy as between types of Democracy. England today, as I understand it, is a Monarchy only in name. When I studied political philosophy contemporary England was presented as an example of a state where parliament has absolute sovereignty; as I understand it, parliament could abolish the Monarchy tomorrow, as it effectively abolished the House of Lords recently.
But more important is Macaulay’s distinction between the “limited” monarchies of the middle ages–where the King could not legislate or raise taxes without the consent of parliament, and had to rule in accordance with the laws of the land–and the “absolute” or Macro-Monarchies that followed.
This is very relevant to a consideration of the French Revolution. The great Catholic sociologist and historian de Tocqueville, in “The Ancient Regime”, argued that Louis XIV transformed the French Monarchy from limited to absolute–by stripping power from the aristocracy and local government and concentrating it in his hands. So in its initial phase the Revolution was directed against an absolute state, it was an attempt to return to the medieval tradition. But later the Commitee for Public Safety and Napoleon took over the mechanism that Louis XIV had created. The totalitarianism of the Republic was thus a continuation of the totalitarianism of Macro-Monarchism.
Macro-Monarchy is not I think anymore attractive a form of government than Macro-Democracy. It is equally far from the great medieval tradition–which is essentially that of St. Thomas Aquinas, in his ideal of a “mixed” government with elements of monarchy, aristocracy and democracy balancing one another.
monarchy does make sense when there’s an ethnic homogeniety in the population (thus Canada needed to be separate from the British monarchy because of the French)! But monarchy can also be elective from among the Dukes, as seemed to have been the pattern in Teutonic lands before Christianity, I believe. In such a succession policy, the present Charles might be bypassed for a better candidate from among the Royals. And there’s no reason why SOME sort of participation by the people –maybe just a veto right — be available.
It’s refreshing to see that the reputation of the last Stuart king has been restored somewhat over the last few generations. Any number of his actions are difficult to square with the false image of him as a soulless tyrant, but especially worthy of the attention of any student of history is the favor he showed to William Penn and the Quakers. He intervened on their behalf when they sought from Charles II a charter for what became the colony named for Penn, who was its original proprietor. God bless his memory.
http://www.portal.state.pa.us/portal/server.pt/community/overview_of_pennsylvania_history/4281/1681-1776__the_quaker_province/478727
There are some things we all know to be true. We can’t defend them, can’t account for them, so we don’t acknowledge them, often not even to ourselves. We don’t discuss them, don’t argue about them, and don’t even pretend to understand them. Yet we *know* they are true without anyone telling us. Some examples:
1. Evil really exists.
2. Marriage really is for life.
3. There really is God.
4. Monarchy is the true form of government, by natural law, and even when a king is bad, he’s still the king.
No psychoanalysis is going to rationalize evil into an illusion.
No piece of paper or mere legality is going to undo a marriage.
You know there is God because He tells you so Himself (constantly).
No elected or non-elected body is going to make a king out of someone who is not just by calling him “king.”
Some things are just true, that’s all.
Monarchy makes sense when the nation’s majority is ethnically one. But monarchy need not have descent as the form of perpetuating itself, but as it was in primitive societies (among the warriors) by voting, choosing from among the best of the ducal royals. And nothing prevents some participation by the general populationg by having a veto vote that must reach over 2/3rds the majory. Thus rigid rules of the first born can be rectified so as to obtain a competent ruler. Also, it can be required that the monarchy to consult representatives before deciding things.
Splendid! My initial post was intended as a broadside intended to provoke an intelligent reaction. We have it! I am grateful for all these comments, all of which strike me as intelligent and thought-provoking. In an age when Big Brother poses as a Democrat it’s important that we begin to think outside the box in which we’ve been imprisoned.