Be Faithful And Bear True Allegiance

Watching the extravaganza in China, I mused that, whereas Princess Anne was there specifically as a British member of the IOC, the Queen, had she been present, would have had to stand up for every one of her Realms and Territories that had sent a team. And that would have been an awful lot of standing up. In London in 2012, we shall doubtless see her do just that, even at 86. The Queen is a real old pro.

Which brings me to the Lib Dem MP Norman Baker, who is campaigning (along with, among others, the Tory former Cabinet Minister, Peter Bottomley) to abolish the MPs’ Oath of Allegiance to the monarch, apparently in order to bring these things up to date. Well, I for one would like to know the precise date on which the monarchy was abolished, if Dr Baker’s campaign has any meaning whatever.

In any case, an Oath of Allegiance to the monarch is in fact to the supremacy of Parliament, which determines the succession to the Throne, and within which the final say has passed to the House of Commons, which has itself come to be elected by universal suffrage. It is, in other words, precisely what Dr Baker and his supporters claim to want – an Oath of Allegiance to their constituents and to the nation as a whole.

Furthermore, it is effectively an Oath of Allegiance to the family containing all those countries for whose teams the Queen would have had to stand up (and will do so), plus several more besides: in those that are sovereign states (the Commonwealth Realms), our Parliament and the inheritors of its tradition consciously choose to determine that the same person shall always accede to all their respective Thrones; while the others (variously dependent on or associated with the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand or the Crown itself) freely choose to maintain their current status.

And it is an Oath of Allegiance to the Christian roots of all three of this country’s principal political traditions, since, while the succession to the Throne can be altered by Parliament (and thus effectively by the elected House of Commons), nevertheless the ordinary operation of the monarchical system gives a direct constitutional role to God Who is active in His world, and that system is otherwise indefensible. Thus is embodied both a check on any excessively high view of the capabilities of Originally Sinful human nature, and a check on any excessively low view of the capabilities of human nature redeemed in Christ, the God-Man.

It is no wonder that everywhere still having the Queen as Head of State has a Christian majority, and that the Great Council of Chiefs of Fiji (drawn from that country’s Melanesian, Christian population) continues to recognise Her Majesty as Paramount Chief long after Fiji (with its Indian, overwhelmingly non-Christian majority) bloodily removed Her Majesty as Head of State.

There must, of course, be one Oath of Allegiance, taken by all parliamentarians, who are and must be all there on the same basis. Parliamentary sovereignty, the Commonwealth, and the Christian roots of all three political traditions are that basis, superbly expressed by, in, through and as the current Oath of Allegiance.