Thirty years ago many Australians wondered if it was logical for their country's head of state to be a foreign monarch, the heir to the British crown. They saw it as a colonial relic. Wasn't it about time Australia had an Australian head of state?
The debate was taking flight. The Labor Party came out in favor of a republic. The Prime Minister, Paul Keating, was in favor of calling a referendum so that the citizens could pronounce themselves. He visited London and decided that if he was going to call a referendum he should tell Queen Elizabeth first, if only out of courtesy. She was still the country's head of state. It was logical that she would inform him personally.
Keating went to see her in Balmoral and explained that many people in Australia thought it better for the head of state to be Australian and that the government intended to hold a referendum so that the citizens could decide whether they wanted the country to be a republic or they preferred it to remain a monarchy and for the head of state to be the king or queen of the United Kingdom.
They say that Queen Elizabeth listened to him attentively, in silence. Keating insisted that there was nothing personal against her, but the desire of many citizens to have an Australian head of state. The queen listened to him, saying nothing. Her silence was increasingly uncomfortable. Puzzled, Keating explained that his government thought a referendum was the best way to make a decision.
Finally, the queen smiled:
"Thank you very much," he said. Would you like a gin and tonic?
And they didn't talk about it anymore.
The anecdote -impossible to verify- says many things. It sounds like a joke, but it's not, or not at all. It is a sample of the spirit of the British monarchy. Offering him a gin and tonic, the queen was telling Keating that she had earned it because of the role she had had to make. But she was also telling him that since there was nothing she could do, they had better have a gin and tonic and talk about other things.
That is to say: with great subtlety, he was telling her that thank you very much for telling him all that, but that she was a constitutional monarch and that her obligation was to respect the will of the citizens, and that the decision to call a referendum corresponded to him, as Prime Minister, and that it was her turn to accept it and accept what the Australian people decided.
It is this attitude that allows, in the 21st century, the British Prime Minister, the leader of the opposition and the members of the British Parliament, against all probability, to accept that they are subjects of a hereditary monarch and that this monarch is the head of State, pass laws, announce government policies, declare wars, and grant honors and titles of nobility to citizens.
Many Britons believe that one of the advantages of the monarchy is continuity, the succession of monarchs for more than a thousand years, only interrupted during the eleven years of the revolutionary hiatus of the seventeenth century. If they were more fond of intellectual constructions, perhaps they would talk about the feeling of identity that the monarchy gives to the British people, but since they live on an island and are very clear about who they are, they prefer to talk about tradition and the feeling of permanence that crowns it. provides them.
Elizabeth II reigned for more than seventy years. During her reign, the private life of the royal family and the public existence of the institution experienced moments of disagreement. It is possible that during the reign of Carlos III there were also contradictions and turbulence, and for biological reasons it is highly unlikely that Carlos III would reign for so many years. But this will not be too important as long as the crown continues to arouse the support, with greater or lesser enthusiasm, of the majority of citizens.
In the UK, members of the royal family are more popular than politicians. I wonder if one of the secrets of this accession is not the attitude of not taking a position on any political issue - not even on whether Australia should be a monarchy or a republic - the discipline of accepting at all times what the citizens decide.
The United Kingdom does not have a written Constitution, but the crown that Charles III formally wears since yesterday is one of the pillars of the country's constitutional architecture, and most likely it will continue to be so as long as its holders understand that it is not a magical institution, but earthly and at the service of citizens, subject to their will. The strength of the British monarchy lies not in the power it has, but in the power it has deprived others of having. By the fact that it exists, it has contributed to avoiding the rise of dictators over the last three centuries, as in other European countries.
Australians, by the way, held a referendum in 1999, decided that Australia should remain a monarchy, and have accepted Charles III as the country's new head of state.
