Vice-Regal Saint: Is Elizabeth Regina a Europhile?
OR NOT, AS THE CASE MAY BE. It must ever be a matter of some dark doubt in the minds of monarchists, this royal house of ours and its actions in light of the EU. I don't wish to impute anything involving freemasons or aliens. However, the plain face of Her Majesty Elizabeth II freshly giving her Royal Assent to the latest infraction of her sovereignty - the accursed Lisbon Treaty - shows us, as Archbishop Cranmer notes, something unnerving. "Is," he asks, "Her Majesty a committed Europhile?"
"Is she complicit in this whole sordid agenda of ‘ever closer union’ to create a country called Europe? Is she guilty of placing her people in bondage to a foreign, unelected and unaccountable power?"
Now we mustn't fall back on the canard that she has no choice. It has long been the custom that Buckingham Palace, rather than being forced to deny Assent and cause a damaging controversy, may alert ministers of the Crown to their intense distaste for mooted laws long in advance, and so prevent their being brought forward and causing unnecessary constitutional contretemps. It is perfectly easy to imagine the Queen, several treaties ago, doing just that with the EU.
But she didn't. Not even when her people, if not their representatives, were soundly in favour of her doing so (and remain so now). Not even when the only democratic mandate for the European project stops at a free and common market (as it does). Far from simply bowing to democratic pressure for fear of revolution, she has pressed on against it.
So is she to be numbered with James II? Do we stand in need of another Glorious Revolution? What on earth is going on?
The only way I can think it might be explained is by the same reason that nearly all in the West currently submit weakly to the present-tense, whatever it may be. Everyone moves through life, now, as if in a haze. The saddle of history lies empty and ignored by all save the wicked, perverted and radical, who like nothing more than to leap into it for an afternoon's ruinous galavanting. The nonsense of Marxist inevitability, and a kind of deeply weird transposition of evolutionary myth (that everything is always getting better, which is by no means Darwinian) into society, has left her - and most - it seems, utterly supine before the advance of numerous specific ideological agendas.
And this is sadly no excuse. The fact is, history goes in one direction till it doesn't. And she is just as much a figure upon its stage as any of her predecessors; and shall be reckoned up against them all, and find her place next to Alfred or Unready according to her actions. If she is merely dithering, she is doing so just as actively and positively as if she were running up the colours, sounding the trumpets and calling all men unto her.
I think one of the better ideas for the fourth plinth in Trafalgar Square has been the erection of a permanent statue of Her Majesty when once she has become the longest reigning British sovereign. It is not many years off. But it might be pertinent to ask quite in what sense she is any more the British sovereign - pooled European sovereignty, European citizenship, European legal supremacy, European civil service, foreign policy, army and all?
Alas, I think she has now ceded the honour. The weirdest thing of all is that she has committed a revolution against herself. Thus is once more proved the fatuity of the 'wisdom' of our times.
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20 comments:
Grave tidings, Sir Walter. I don't know what to think at the present moment, other than a very fine post.
His Grace is praying and fasting, for his spirit is sorely burdened.
I am astounded at the absence of any meaningful debate in the British House of Commons (and political class in general) as to the meaning, significance and permanence of European integration on the levels you've identified.
It appears as though Mr. Cameron and his lot are unenthusiastic about all this Europeanisation business. Do we anticipate his forceful affirmation of the United Kingdom as a free and independent country upon his assumption of the prime ministerial responsibilities?
M
"Alas, I think she has now ceded the honour. The weirdest thing of all is that she has committed a revolution against herself."
Not quite.
We don't know exactly what is going on at the moment although recent world events might have given us a clue.
One thing is certain: technically, the Lisbon treaty has not been ratified yet.
We'll see what happens in the end.
Meanwhile, let us not lose faith.
"It has long been the custom that Buckingham Palace, rather than being forced to deny Assent and cause a damaging controversy, may alert ministers of the Crown to their intense distaste for mooted laws long in advance, and so prevent their being brought forward and causing unnecessary constitutional contretemps."
I'd like to see a source for that which doesn't use the adjective "unnamed."
Eh?
It's publicly acknowledged procedure.
Can I just say, as an impartial observer, that this whole thing is a lot of rot. Britain is voluntarily ceding some of its sovereignty to be part of an intranational organisation, no different from joining the UN or signing a multilateral agreement of some other form.
Having said that I do not agree with the Treaty of Lisbon and believe it shoudl not be ratified, but it is not the end of independent Britain.
"But it might be pertinent to ask quite in what sense she is any more the British sovereign"
Are you sure this is The Monarchist website? Have I come to the wrong place?
Yes, this is ukip.
A defence of her majesty will follow...too busy at present.
BB
In response to Lord Best's statement above, when he said that the Lisbon Treaty is not the end of an independent Britain, I wonder if he's actually READ the Lisbon Treaty?!
The Treaty Will, amongst other things:
-Create a full-time EU President;
-Create an EU Foreign Minister, re-named as 'High Representative';
-Create an EU diplomatic service for the new Foreign Minister;
-Give the EU the ability to make international agreements in its own right and to have representation on international bodies. (READ COMMON FOREIGN POLICY FOR THE LAST THREE)
-Move closer to having a single EU Justice System
-Extend the powers of EuroPol, the European Police Force
-increases EU power over social policy, social security, employment and public health policies.
All of these things are highly intrusive of independent national policy and are vastly different from joining the UN etc. This is the end of independent national governments, EU Law will be supreme, this is the end of Britain.
And when the vast majority of people want a referendum, Britain is hardly, "voluntarily" ceding it's soverignty.
As for the Queen, I've been a Monarchist my entire life, I was brought up to respect the Monarchy and the role it plays in our society and in the whole of the Commonwealth. But I think Her Majesty is betraying not only her Coronation oath by doing this but also the promise she made that she would give her whole life, be it long or short to the service of her people, she's not serving us by going along with this. Her father would never have gone along with something like this. But, having said that, with how Gordon and his cronies are pushing things through, doing what they want and getting rid of anything that stands in their way, I doubt she has very much choice.
Is there no way of leaving the EU? Will the power crazed hyperpower that is the European Union take military action to prevent Britain leaving?
No.
Nations voluntarily cede parts of their sovereignty every time they sign an international treaty which restricts their actions in any way. Abiding by a UN charter/convention or a trade agreement etc.
It is silly, sensationalist and over emotional to argue that this will end independent Britain. It will not. To argue otherwise is either wilful deceit, ignorance of basic statecraft or self deception.
I have seen exactly this same type of hysterie a couple of years ago when australia was gearing up to sign a free trade agreement with the USA. Strangely enough, the anti-American fuelled doomsday predictions did not occur nor will the anti-European fuelled doomsday predictions occur.
This is slightly more than a Free Trade agreement!
Yes but the principle is the same. It is a voluntary cession of sovereignty by a sovereign power. It is impermanent in so far that the sovereign state can opt out of the treaty and regain the sovereignty it ceded. Thus Britain will retain its full independence even if it gives precedence to the EU in some areas, as it is doing so by its own choice.
Not quite. The avowed goal (and text of each treaty, including Lisbon) is "ever-closer union": not simply ever greater co-operation, but ever greater blurring, blending and melting of our institutions and nations together.
In every area it touches it seeks not co-operation but co-ordination. Law, taxation, regulation, social policy, now (may God, Nelson and Wellington save us) the armed forces - do you not see just how much falls under its purview, and how much will be seriously and lastingly altered by its edicts? Already post office closures are being forced on us across the land thanks to stupid meddling laws designed for such a diverse continent. Do you see them being rebuilt and reopened once we have pulled out? Do you see anything else that has been undone, being redone? The way of mankind sees that very little such restoration ever occurs.
Yes, we can pull out. But I'd rather that doing so didn't mean having to rebuild the labour of centuries of Britons in order to get back to where we were before the whole sorry show started. As it stands, pulling out before pretty long would leave us almost identical to the rest of Europe - only separate. Having been brought in line with the rest of Europe on everything from prison sentences to tax levels to army structure to beer glasses, we would find it very hard to see the point. (Which is, of course, the creepy point of much of this activity... to render opposition ultimately moot).
It isn't merely a benign federalism, like pre-Civil War USA. (And see how easy *that* was to secede from - regardless of your views of the vile sin of slavery, which of course that war was not fought over). It is a centralising, streamlining, steamrolling, unelected, unaccountable bureacracy; and far from being voluntarily submitted to, we submit to it only at the connivance of the continent's entire political class against its entire population.
And the stickier we get together, the harder - and more pointless - a separation becomes. What will be left to save, when everything has been made the same?
Yes, it is a bad treaty, and a threat to traditional British institutions. But it is not the end of independent Britain. just the beginning of a Britain voluntarily enmeshed in Europe.
Lord Best you keep falling back on the idea that this is "Voluntary" or that we're doing it by "our own choice" but can you explain to me how that can be so when the actual British public haven't EVER been given a referendum on the European Union in it's current form? (They were given a vote in 1975 on the EEC when it was still only a "Free Trade Zone which I think we can all agree that this has moved far beyond.)
You are confusing voluntary with democratic. The STATE is doing this voluntarily, but not democratically. That is wrong. We can only hope a future conservative government will take action on this issue.
I want to make it clear, again, that I in no way support the treaty, its ratification or the behaviour of the EU. But so long as ratification of the Treaty and membership of the EU remain voluntary and repealing the Treaty or leaving the EU go unpunished, it is not a threat to British independence.
As far as I was aware, the United Kingdom does not have a precedence for referendums because of the idea of Parliamentary Sovereignty and Responsible and Representative Government. The Representatives of the People in Parliament voted for ratification and the Sovereign is bound by the constitutional principle of Parliamentary Sovereignty to grant assent. Her personal opinions or views have no place in this discussion because the Will of Parliament is Sovereign.
Just because you don't like the decision of Parliament doesn't mean the system didn't work.
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