Can Royals Resist the Lure of the Political Fray — or Might Monarchy’s Magic Melt Away Like the Glaciers?

“Prince William will be king sooner than people expect!” So predicts psychic medium Deborah Davies. She does not provide reasons for her prognostication, whether putative heir to the throne Prince Charles, William’s father, will somehow be bypassed. Even royalists might wonder whether Ms. Davies is too restrained in her reflections. How long will the British monarchy survive once Elizabeth II, one way or the other, retires the crown?The hero of Brexit, Nigel Farage, certainly does not mince words. Commenting on the Prince of Wales’s confession that he “understands the frustration” of climate activist groups Extinction Rebellion and Insulate Britain, Mr. Farage advises the Prince to “stay out of active politics.”“If one man can bring down the monarchy, if one man can bring this to an end it’s Prince Charles — through stupid, thoughtless statements based on eco-alarmism,” he said. The Prince might sympathize with eco-extremists but, reckons Mr. Farage, “the vast majority of the public don’t. We are absolutely furious with them.”On this head, Prince William stands with his father. Addressing his “Earthshot” Prize conference with a sermon to the converted, he called upon “humankind” to “unite in repairing our planet.” He’d already berated space entrepreneurs for prioritizing space ambitions. Innovators, William suggested, should be “fixed on trying to repair this planet, not trying to find the next place to go and live.”None in the Royal Family, it seems, are immune. Or are they? At the opening of the Welsh Assembly last week, Elizabeth II was overheard saying in reference to the coming climate conference COP26 in Glasgow, “We only know about people who are not coming . . . it is very irritating when they talk, but they don’t do.”The press has taken this to mean that the Queen, too, is all in on climate. Yet Breitbart London’s canny correspondent, James Delingpole, dismisses the dominant narrative. “These are not the words of someone frustrated that more isn’t being done to ‘combat’ climate change,” he retorts. “They’re the words of an irritated, upper class host who is irked that her guests haven’t RSVP-ed her party invitation.”Lest we get too optimistic that a streak of common sense remains with the Royals, we return to the Prince of Wales. He delights in converting his grandson, Prince George, to the climate consensus. “‘When I was his age, people had no idea about the damage they were doing,” Prince Charles laments. So Grandpa indoctrinates George that “the big storms, and floods, the droughts, fires and food shortages” are all due to mankind’s short-sightedness.Where’s the Duke of Edinburgh when we need him? For we cannot help but think that Prince Philip would have sought to set his family straight on these matters. Sadly, the Duke is no longer alive to keep “The Firm” focussed on the predicament of royal life in the 21st century.The convention is that the crown stands outside — or above — politics. Yet what is more political than global warming? The facts of anthropocentric climate change might be “settled” in the view of the Royal Family, but it would be hard to conclude that they are settled politically. If they were, someone might have taken the Paris Accord to the United States Senate for ratification as a treaty.Nor can we forget that on an issue that is arguably more pertinent to monarchy, Britain’s regaining political sovereignty from the European Union and taking back its independence, the Windsors were mute. Well and good, we say. Yet this eagerness to enter the public discourse in pursuit of their preferred causes ill serves them and the case for the British crown. In seeking to court favor with current opinion that is, in essence, hostile to monarchy, the Royal Family is alienating its natural allies.Your Diarist has already written on the British popular historian who believes that Prince George has little chance of succeeding to the throne. A survey conducted by Deltapoll this spring found that 47% of respondents wanted William to succeed Elizabeth II, with only 27% favoring Prince Charles. A full 18% said that the monarchy should cease with the culmination of Elizabeth’s reign.The Victorian sage Walter Bagehot would be aghast. “We must not let in daylight upon magic,” he wrote of the British monarchy. “We must not bring it into the combat of politics, or it will cease to be reverenced by all combatants; it will become one combatant among many.”It remains to be seen if any in the Royal Family has the sense of self-preservation — not to mention the natural royal reticence — to resist the temptations of the political stage. It is the only way to restore the public confidence that has sustained the monarch so far. Or has the British monarchy shed its mystery for good?________BrexitDiarist@gmail.com. Image: Detail of an illustration of Elizabeth II, by Michael Kooiman, via Wikipedia Commons.

Can Royals Resist the Lure of the Political Fray — or Might Monarchy’s Magic Melt Away Like the Glaciers?

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