The Schütz Model for an Elected Australian Constitutional Monarchy
What a strange world cyberspace is. One minute I am raised to the level of defender of magisterial Catholicism in Australia, the next moment, I am hailed as the proposer of a model for a new Australian Constitution! Having blogged on Clive James' comments about our freedom under the Crown some weeks ago, I find that no less a personage than Professor David Flint of the Australians For a Constitutional Monarchy movement has discovered "Sentire Cum Ecclesia" and the "Schütz Model for an Elected Australian Constitution Monarchy". In the vain hope that someone out there may be listening, I have put the "Schütz Model" in the side bar under the "Catholic Blogger's Creed". You never know...
By the way, some time ago, I read Professor Flint's "Twilight of the Elites". He has some good things to say.
posted by Schütz @ 8:58 pm
3 Comments
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3 Comments:
Errrrrr, the whole point of monarchy is that it is hereditary. If you want a President for Life, you can have a Republic.
You could have an Australian Monarch by inviting somebody to be King or Queen (as the Norwegians did in 1905) and separating your allegiance from the one you currently have.
The Catholic blog is great! The constitutional bit needs a bit of work.
No, I disagree. Monarchy does not have to be hereditary. After all, the Monarch of the Holy Roman Empire was not hereditary in the days of the German Electors.
And I don't know of any Republic which elects their president for the term of his natural life.
And there was a time when a "constitutional monarchy" would have seemed contrary to definition as well. After all, don't all monarch's rule by divine right? Since when does a monarch reign by the will of the people? Well, since the Glorious Revolution of 1688, that's when.
So, in this thoroughly modern world, where everyone is somebody and nobody's anybody (as Gilbert and Sullivan so memorably put it), why can't we re-write the rules and have something between the Monarchy as it now exists and the Republican models as they are put to us?
Maybe, to be strictly accurate, we should say that the head of state who is elected for life is "Sovereign" rather than "monarch". Would that make you happy, Tony? He/she could still be crowned, no?
You can rewrite the rules all you like, but your Sovereign/Monarch would still be President for Life.
I don't buy the Holy Roman Emperor analogy: any candidate was already Sovereign, and was anyway only a candidate by accident of birth.
I think I would argue that the Crown (in British constitutional use) is vested in a family, and that the Monarch is that member of the family by law established etc etc. This gives you the extra, the traditional dimension, that a President for Life wouldn't have.
You also run the risk of (say) deciding to unelect Mr Howard as PM and elect him King/Sovereign/Monarch/President for Life on a wave of sentiment and find he's still there 20 years later. How do you stop the Head of State post from being a retirement post for a redundant politician?
Sorry, mate: I think you want a republic with trappings.
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