Why the Monarchy Still Matters

I n advance of her brother’s coronation yesterday, Princess Anne gave a rare interview to CBS Australia. The princess described how “touching” and “impressive” it was to see thousands of people lining the roads to pay their last respects to their mother, Queen Elizabeth II, as a hearse transported her body from Balmoral to Edinburgh. Princess Anne noted the rural communities who, in their attention to detail, had cleaned their tractors and plaited their horses’ manes.

When her interviewer asked whether she was concerned about “relevance,” or the future of the monarchy, she gave a firm “No.” According to Anne, “the monarchy provides, with the constitution, a degree of long-term stability that is actually quite hard to come by any other way.” It would appear the British public agrees. Polling conducted after the queen’s death shows majority support for constitutional monarchy, with less than a quarter against.

Some anti-monarchy protesters booed and shouted “Not My King!” as Charles passed on his route to Westminster Abbey. Other protesters were arrested on suspicion of breaching the peace, conspiracy to cause public nuisance, and possessing articles to cause criminal damage, according to the British police. One anti-monarchy activist, Symon Hill, explains that while Elizabeth II was “always just there, like rivers and mountains,” now people are “more bothered because it feels like they are actively being told to accept something.”

This may have been true in the past, when denouncing the monarch was a crime punishable by death. But now it seems silly, not least because – as Dan McLaughlin wrote in 2021 — the monarchy has been bleeding power for centuries. By the end of Charles I’s reign in 1649, the king was executed by parliamentarians and the office of King formally abolished. The monarchy was restored in 1660, with the return of Charles II from exile. Another tumultuous period, of course, was the Glorious Revolution, out of which came the bill of rights establishing the independence of Parliament.

Reminders of the monarch’s fragility were woven into the coronation pageantry. For instance, the crown used is Saint Edward’s Crown, made for the Coronation of Charles II in 1661. The original — an 11th-century crown belonging to the royal Saint Edward the Confessor — had been melted down in 1649 by parliamentarians.

Then there’s the crown’s turbulent religious history. The palace noted the “the Coronation is a solemn religious service.” Though undeniably a Christian ceremony, there was a strong emphasis on ecumenicalism, with representatives from different religions present. Particularly notable was the decision to include music by William Byrd, a Catholic composer at work during the anti-Catholic reign of Elizabeth I. Pope Francis gave King Charles a relic of the true cross. The oil used to anoint the king was blessed by an Orthodox patriarch.

Of course, in modern times the British public have never been less Christian. According to data published by the Office of National Statistics, the number of people identifying with “no religion” increased by over 8 million, from 25 percent to 37 percent between 2011 and 2021, with those identifying as Christians now in the minority, from 59 percent to 46 percent.

This, too, has been centuries in the making. In his 1941 essay “England Your England,” George Orwell wrote that “the common people are without definite religious belief and have been so for centuries. The Anglican Church never had a real hold on them . . . And yet they have retained a deep tinge of Christian feeling, while almost forgetting the name of Christ.”

The modern monarchy lacks political or religious power. And yet its cultural prominence has only been enhanced by this fact. Queen Elizabeth II left behind a legacy of service. Charles III, nicknamed “climate king,” adopted environmentalism as his cause as early as the 1970s. Though sincere, this was also strategically inoffensive. In ages past, the monarch waged wars and colonized countries. Today, he plants trees.

If the monarch is tame, so is support for and even opposition against him. A thousand or so people in yellow vests and signs expressed their distaste for the new monarch. Meanwhile, thousands of others gathered with friends, family, and neighbors to share in a “coronation quiche” featuring spinach, tarragon, and cheddar cheese. For all its variety, gentleness, and eccentricity — there can’t be a better articulation of Britishness than that.