As an American, I am often confused by the British monarchy and government’s “separation of powers.” Before this week, it seemed like prime ministers and Parliament basically left all of the title debates and housing issues up to the monarch’s prerogative. But Prince Andrew’s situation has changed everything, as MPs are loudly fuming about the monarchy’s mismanagement of this crisis. There is a growing political consensus that Andrew cannot be allowed to live out his days in a grand and rent-free 30-room mansion on the Windsor estate. It’s very likely that Parliament will have a formal inquiry into Royal Lodge and perhaps even the wider mismanagement of the Crown Estates. But there’s also proposed legislation to give the monarch power to remove titles on his own, only needing a “recommendation” from Parliament. The NY Times tried to explain:
Britain has been one of the world’s most durable constitutional monarchies, in part because its two pillars — the crown and Parliament — stay out of each other’s business. King Charles III steers clear of politics, while Prime Minister Keir Starmer leaves the affairs of the royal family to the monarch. That longstanding arrangement has come under rare stress in the last week, following scandalous new disclosures about Prince Andrew, the king’s younger brother, and his ties to the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
The details were outlined in a newly published email between Andrew and Mr. Epstein, and in a memoir by Virginia Roberts Giuffre, an Epstein victim who accused Andrew of raping her when she was a teenager — an accusation he denies. They have led to calls for him to be stripped of his most familiar title, prince. This would likely require an act of parliament.
That, in turn, has set off a chicken-and-egg debate. The government says the decision of whether to deprive Andrew of his titles is one for the king, not for Mr. Starmer. Officials at Buckingham Palace say it would be improper for the king to take any position on a parliamentary act that might come before him for royal assent. Both sides are drawing on centuries of convention, a powerful argument in a country with an unwritten constitution. Yet as the outcry grows over Andrew’s alleged misconduct during his friendship with Mr. Epstein, falling back on century-old laws and even more ancient customs is proving contentious.
“The argument that this is purely a matter for the royal family will not wash,” said Vernon Bogdanor, an expert on the constitutional monarchy at King’s College London. “Our monarchy since 1689 has been a parliamentary one. It exists only so long as Parliament, representing the people, want it to continue.”
On Wednesday, a Labour member of Parliament, Rachael Maskell, introduced a bill that would give the king the authority to rescind royal titles on his own initiative, following a recommendation from a parliamentary committee. Without the government’s support, however, it has little chance to pass.
Last Friday, Andrew announced that he would stop using one of his titles, the Duke of York, a step he took under pressure from his brother Charles. But he did not formally lose either the dukedom or the title of prince, to which he is entitled under a 1917 royal prerogative, known as a Letters Patent. Under that decree, issued by King George V, the title of prince or princess is limited to the child of a monarch, the child of the sons of a monarch, and the eldest living son of the eldest son of the Prince of Wales, the heir to the throne. Amending the Letters Patent to strip Andrew of his title is possible, experts have said, but it would be such a grave, unusual step that it would probably happen only if the king and the government agreed in advance.
This is interesting from a how-the-sausage-is-made perspective, but it also has larger repercussions. Let’s be real – everyone can agree that Andrew should be stripped of all of his titles and that he should be forced onto an ice floe and set out to sea. THAT is not the debate. The real debate is: who will do the title-stripping and what happens if and when we give the monarch power to strip titles at will, with nominal input from the government? The actual debate is “what happens when we have a king who is petty, jealous and violently unfit to lead, and who uses his power to childishly settle scores?” Gee, I wonder why everyone is hesitating to give the crown these powers???
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.
