Friday, January 14, 2005

Is the Monarchy against the public interest?

6th February, 1649, after the execution of Charles I, the monarchy was officially abolished by parliament. It was written in the Journal of the House of Commons:

“Resolved, &c. That it hath been found by Experience, and this House doth declare, That the Office of a King in this Nation, and to have the Power thereof in any Single Person, is unnecessary, burdensome, and dangerous to the Liberty, Safety, and publick Interest of the People of this Nation; and therefore ought to be abolished: And that an Act be brought in, to that Purpose.”

Is this still true? Does experience show that the monarchy is unnecessary and burdensome? Does it limit our liberty? And is an act of abolishion still required?

By law, MPs are not allowed to discuss the monarchy on the floor of the House of Commons, so it is up to us.

In some other countries the public figures always swear allegiance to the people or the constitution. However members of parliament and other figures in Britain must swear an oath of allegiance to the Queen. This gives many MPs a moral dilemma, they have been elected by people who live in their constituency, is not there first allegiance to them?

In the swearing in ceremony, some MPs are forced to be dishonest and cross their fingers behind their back or speak in such a way that shows their disgust. Even worse, some Northern Irish elected MPs have been not allowed to enter the parliament because of this ceremony, their constituents are effectively disenfranchised.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

I disagree, but I won't waste my typing on anyone who can't spell "public"...

Zeth said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anonymous said...

Come back Oliver Cromwell, all is forgiven!

Sharon J said...

"... It limits our liberty and an act of abolishion is still required..."

There's one problem with your arguement and that's the fact that you don't actually have one without any explanation of how the monarchy actually limits our liberty.

~Sharon

Anonymous said...

abolish the monarchy now

Alan the Red said...

Sharon said "There's one problem with your argument and that's the fact that you don't actually have one without any explanation of how the monarchy actually limits our liberty."

Take a look at this then:

http://www.eutruth.org.uk/traitors.html

List of Traitors to the UK.

Numero Uno: Elizabeth II - Queen of Scotland. (We haven't had an English Queen since Elizabeth I)

alex said...

I don't really think that "we havn't had an English queen since Elizabeth 1st" can constitute an argument. There is no such thing as an "English" person, just as there is no such thing as a Spanish person or any other nationality come to that. So to get rid of an entire institution and a head of state because their ancestral history regarding Briton doesn't stretch back to the dawn of time is inherantly racist. I dont think that you will find and "MP" who has Britons interests at heart quite like the queen does.

MaximumRob said...

This debate seems to be getting off track, Alex there are British and Spanish and Americans. Race isn't the only thing that defines a person, nationality can, where you come from in that nation can also (difference between East and west coast or the North and South in the States). But that is neither here nor there, just really don't like people using racism arguements, they are detrimental to debate.
The important thing that I see here is that we must look at history I see charges of the Queen being a traitor and someone saying that Oliver Cromwell needs to come back, which I hope was a joke. Historically the King or Queen can't be a traitor because as famously put by King Louis, he/she is the state, the Queen is England and England is the Queen, therefore the queen is no traitor.
Secondly, Parliment is illigitimate since it was disolved under Charles I, prior to his death at the hands of the rabble, who quoted law while disregarding it, so any proclamations that were made from parliment aren't valid, most definately ones that presume to define the monarchy.
I humbly appolagize for any problem with my spelling or the fact that my ideas sometimes flow from me out of order making it hard to read. I truly hope I did not offend anyone with my ideas and will try not to be offended by yours during this friendly conversation.

Anonymous said...

After Lady Diana was killed they held meetings for days to decide the fate of the Monarchy. Does anyone have the notes of the meeting? Can you
publish them?