Changing the rules
Succession reform has caused real political upheaval in the past, writes historian CAROLYN HARRIS. Just ask Scotland.
On January 31, 2012, the Canadian government tabled An Act to Assent to Alterations in the Law Touching the Succession to the Throne in the House of Commons. Appearing just three days after the “Succession to the Crown Bill” passed the House of Commons at Westminster, the legislation in Canada is designed to ensure that the same monarch succeeds to the British and Canadian thrones following the reigns of the current Queen, Prince Charles and Prince William.
At the 2011 Commonwealth heads of government meeting in Perth, Australia, all 16 Commonwealth leaders agreed to accept succession reforms including absolute primogeniture, permission for dynasts to marry Roman Catholics and the repeal of the Royal Marriages Act. The reforms have broad popular support throughout the Commonwealth as they reflect current attitudes toward gender equality and religious freedom. Heritage Minister James Moore explained to reporters in the House lobby, “The legislation will ensure that the Crown remains an institution that can evolve to reflect 21st century values.”
While the substance of the bill has received little opposition, the background and wording of the legislation has created political controversy. Section 41(a) of the 1982 Constitution Act states that any amendment to the “office of the Queen” requires the unanimous consent of Parliament and the provincial legislatures.
The backgrounder to the Canadian succession bill, however, argues that succession reform does not affect the prerogatives of the Canadian Crown and therefore does not require a constitutional amendment. Canada’s Parliament “assenting” to British legislation under the terms of the 1931 Statute of Westminster may be the most expedient way to reform the royal succession but it is reminiscent of a previous era when Canada did not have full sovereignty as a nation.
The political controversy generated by the Canadian succession bill has a clear historical precedent. The 1701 Act of Settlement addressed the succession to the thrones of two kingdoms, England and Scotland, which had shared a common monarch since the ascension of King James VI of Scotland as James I of England in 1603.
Throughout the 17th century, the Scots fiercely defended their political and religious independence from England. When Charles I attempted to impose the Book of Common Prayer on the Scottish church in 1637, he faced riots that culminated in the Bishops’ Wars, a precursor to the English Civil Wars. Charles II received his coronation as King of Scotland in 1651, nine years before the Restoration of the monarchy in England because Oliver Cromwell wished to introduce a “Godly Britannic Union” that would deprive the Scots of their political and religious autonomy.
While the substance of the bill has received little opposition, the background and wording of the legislation has created political controversy.
With this history of Scottish independence, negotiating succession reform that would be acceptable to both the English and the Scots was a complicated endeavour. Succession to the English throne became a parliamentary responsibility with the Glorious Revolution of 1688. Although King William III and his wife and co-ruler, Queen Mary II, both had hereditary claims to the throne, they reigned at the invitation of parliament, which sought to ensure a Protestant succession. When the only surviving son of Mary’s sister, the future Queen Anne, died in 1700, England and Scotland faced a succession crisis, which provoked a parliamentary debate about the future of the monarchy.
In England, members of the Tory party favoured heredity, arguing that Anne’s successor should be either her exiled halfbrother James, who had been dismissed as the Warming Pan Baby at the time of the Glorious Revolution, or her first cousin AnneMarie d’Orleans. In contrast, the Whig party dismissed both these candidates because of their Roman Catholicism, insisting that the Queen’s successor should be her nearest Protestant relative, Princess Sophia of Hanover. The Whigs prevailed and the Act of Settlement confined the succession to Sophia’s Protestant descendants.
Instead of passing its own version of the Act of Settlement, the Scottish parliament maintained its 17th century tradition of political autonomy. The 1704 Act of Security stated that in the event of Queen Anne’s death without issue, the Scots would acclaim a Protestant sovereign but not Sophia unless England and Scotland reached an agreement on a variety of political, economic and religious issues. Although this Scottish Act did not receive royal assent, concern that an independent Scottish parliament would acclaim a different sovereign than England directly precipitated the Act of Union of 1707. With full political union achieved between England and Scotland, Sophia’s eldest son succeeded Anne as King George I of Great Britain in 1714.
Despite this orderly succession, the political reverberations of the Act of Settlement and Act of Union continued for centuries. The Hanoverian Kings faced direct challenges from Jacobite claimants to the throne until 1746. Current supporters of Scottish devolution seek a political structure similar to that of 1603, where two independent kingdoms shared a common monarch. The continuing debate over Scotland’s place in the United Kingdom demonstrates the lasting political consequences that are possible when succession reform occurs in separate countries that share the same monarch.
In contrast to other European nations that have introduced absolute primogeniture in recent decades such as Sweden and the Netherlands, the 2013 Succession to the Crown Bill in the United Kingdom is serving as a model for similar documents in 15 other nations. The political consequences of the Act of Settlement demonstrate that any succession reform pertaining to multiple countries that share a common sovereign must strike a balance between coordinating legislative efforts and respecting the sovereignty of the individual nations.