Dios, Patria, Fueros, Rey

But how can the last preserve and defend the other three, when he is expected to sign a law legalising abortion merely because the Parliament of the day has happened to approve it? What, then, is he for? In Spain as here, people have managed to convince themselves that monarchs should be politically neutral. Heaven knows either how we have come to think that or why we do so, but here we are, Spaniards and Britons alike.

So in Britain, we need to require that nothing be submitted for Royal Assent unless and until approved by, say, three out of five figures, independent of party, elected by the nation as a whole for a fixed term of, say, five years, with each of us voting for one candidate and the five highest scorers being declared elected at the end. The act of Royal Assent would then bring together the broad traditions, rather than narrow party interests, thus represented: paleocon, neoliberal-neocon, Liberal, Socialist, and combining social democracy, moral and social conservatism, and British and Commonwealth patriotism.

They should try something similar in Spain, too. They, after all, have experienced the alternatives to monarchy. Do they want either or both of those again? Do we want either or both of them at all?