THE British monarchy has had a good year. The 60th anniversary
of the Queen's coronation has reassured our sense of continuity
with the past, while the birth of a new heir promises stability
down several generations into the future.
These are among the reasons why, a poll carried out for The
Sunday Telegraph suggests, three-quarters of those questioned
believe that Prince George will one day become king, and only nine
per cent think that he will not, as Britain will have become a
republic (Telegraph, 28 July).
No monarchy is popular. But popularity in a media-led culture
that delights in making and breaking celebrity is a fickle thing.
And when the pendulum swings again - as it surely will - republican
critics stand ready to stiffen popular disaffection with political
principle.
As the subtitle to a scathing Guardian article by the
left-wing columnist Seumas Milne put it: "Britain's monarchy
embodies inequality and fosters conservatism. An elected head of
state is embarrassingly overdue" (24 July).
IF THE monarchy is to survive in the long term, it needs to rest
on more than the shifting sands of popular sentimentality. It needs
firm foundations in political well-being. I believe that these are
available.
Monarchy as we now have it - with its executive powers entirely
transferred to elected Members of Parliament (except in case of
constitutional crisis) - makes important contributions to political
health. For sure, most of these are symbolic; but symbols can serve
important functions.
First, by embodying continuity and stability, monarchy enables
society to cope with change. Thus, pace the
Guardian, far from fostering conservatism during her
60-year reign, Queen Elizabeth II has actually presided over huge
cultural, social, and political change.
Second, the distinction between the monarchical head of state
and the prime-ministerial head of government makes it easier to
tell criticism of government policy from a lack of patriotic
loyalty - easier than in a US presidential system, where the
symbolic head of the nation and the head of government are the
same.
Next, it is good to have a head of state who can transcend party
politics, and use patronage to support civil society, reminding us
(and politicians) that there is more to public life than elections,
parliamentary debates, and legislation.
THERE is a further benefit, which is more principled, more
Christian, and more fundamentally important than any of the others.
A good political constitution certainly needs a part where rulers
are made sensitive to those whom they rule - an elected legislature
that can hold government to account, and stop it in its tracks.
A good constitution needs a democratic element. After all,
according to a biblical and Christian view, rulers exist to serve
the ruled: kings are expected to be shepherds of their people.
Nevertheless, a Christian view is not naïve about the people. It
does not suppose that the popular will, as expressed in majority
vote, is always right and just. After all, it was the people (the
laos, as in "laity") who bayed for Jesus's blood in the
Gospels, and it was the people (the demos, as in
"democracy") who, according to Acts, responded to Herod, a
persecutor of Christians, by lauding him as a god (Acts 12.21). If
kings can be sinners, then so can the people. Hitler, remember, was
elected by due democratic process.
What this means is that a healthy political constitution should
not - with due respect to Milne - be entirely democratic. In
addition to an elected House of Commons, it needs other parts, too,
to balance it. It needs to be mixed. For example, it needs a House
of Lords composed of a wide range of experts and leaders of civil
society (including the Church of England). It needs an aristocracy
of wisdom, not of land, which can be secured only by appointment,
not by popular election.
It also needs a monarch, who symbolises the accountability of
the whole nation, rulers and ruled, kings and people, to the given
principles of justice. At base, these principles are not human
inventions. They are not the passing creatures of popular whim or
majority vote. They are given in and with the created nature of
things. This is exactly what the coronation ritual says, when the
monarch kneels before receiving the crown - the symbol of authority
- not from below, but from above; not from the fickle people, but
from the constant God.
CONTRARY to what now passes for democratic common sense, the
moral legitimacy of government does not lie in popular consent. It
cannot, since the will of the people can be corrupt.
Rather, moral legitimacy lies in the conformity of law and
policy to the given principles of justice and prudence - to which
the people might or might not adhere.
Popular consent is vital, if law and government policy is to
have effective social authority, but it does not establish its
moral legitimacy. This is a fundamental political truth, which is
rarely spoken nowadays, but which the coronation ritual speaks.
And, in a culture that tends toward populism and moral relativism,
what the coronation says is, ironically, radically prophetic.
I think that there are good reasons - some of them directly
Christian - to support the kind of monarchy that we now have.
Nevertheless, on the more pragmatic questions how much public money
should be used to support it, or how many members of the royal
family should be supported, I am agnostic.
I do not suppose that a monarchical republic is the only decent
kind of republic. None the less, I believe that monarchy can confer
some important and distinctive political benefits; and if we are to
continue to enjoy them - if Prince George is to find a throne -
then we had better bring to mind what they are.
The Revd Dr Nigel Biggar is Regius Professor of Moral and
Pastoral Theology in the University of Oxford, a Canon of Christ
Church, and Director of the McDonald Centre for Theology, Ethics,
and Public Life.