tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25656996.post1054340062144896749..comments2024-03-29T13:45:23.009+00:00Comments on David Lindsay: Of Thrones and ArmchairsDavid Lindsayhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06839882674758833524noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25656996.post-51824310140157941212011-12-31T23:33:48.737+00:002011-12-31T23:33:48.737+00:00Nothing ever dies out completely...Nothing ever dies out completely...David Lindsayhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06839882674758833524noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25656996.post-52094384708563738142011-12-31T01:31:49.185+00:002011-12-31T01:31:49.185+00:00Henry V said he wanted to be King of France, but d...Henry V said he wanted to be King of France, but did not want to be 'King of the Revolution'. Abp Lefebvre praised him for having taken this stance, even though it cost him the crown. If France restores its monarchy (and I think it should) then it should restore an absolute monarchy.Shanehttp://lxoa.wordpress.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25656996.post-20520438070856721922011-12-30T16:25:07.959+00:002011-12-30T16:25:07.959+00:00The Third Republic was an accident, created becaus...The Third Republic was an accident, created because an amendment passed by one vote created a President, and if there was a President, then it followed that there was Republic. The first such President was an aristocratic general of Irish Jacobite ancestry and surname, a committed Legitimist married to a fanatical one.<br /><br />If the monarchy ever came back, then it would probably have to be the Legitimist line. Then again, there could always be Triumvirate, representing the new state's incorporation of all three of Legitimist, Orleanist and Bonapartist values by having the Heads of the three Houses as joint ceremonial Heads of State, while republican values were incorporated by the continuation of a Presidency, though probably more of the German or Italian model. Never say never.<br /><br />Mind you, heaven only knows where that would leave the office of Co-Prince of Andorra.David Lindsayhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06839882674758833524noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25656996.post-3170337389063764502011-12-30T16:08:54.032+00:002011-12-30T16:08:54.032+00:00France became a republic through a century long se...France became a republic through a century long series of improbable events. If Louis XVI and his ministers had not completely bungled the political and financial crisis of the late 1780s, if Napoleon I had taken one of the compromise peace offers in 1813-4 (or even possibly if he had won Waterloo), if Charles X had died earlier, or if France, by then a constitutional monarchy under Napoleon III, had either avoided or won its war with Prussia, some sort of monarchy would have survived into the twentieth century. There was even still a chance in the 1870s if "Henry V" had been more accomodating.<br /><br />On the other hand, you can get an alternate history of a republican Britain with a few changes to events in 1659-60, 1745, several points during the reign of George III, 1830, or even the reign of George VI.<br /><br />De Gaulle was friends with the Count of Paris, but by that time, as they both knew, there were too many plausible pretenders to make a restored monarchy viable, plus the Republic had gotten the country, not always in the most graceful manner, through the turbulence of the first half of the twentieth century.<br /><br />Also, the "monarchial president" of the fifth Republic is to some degree exaggerated. Its not nearly as monarchial an institution as the post WWII American presidency, for example. The French president is much more dependent than the American president on having a friendly majority in the legislature to exercise his powers. Constitutionally, its more of a strengthened version of the third Republic presidency.Ednoreply@blogger.com