Question for British Folk and/or Smart Dudes and/or Ladies
 

Why isn't Prince Phillip a king?

I finally figured out how the hell she got away with being Queen while having a mother. Then I promptly forgot that reasoning. Then I discovered she was married.

I am super confused with your ceremonial royalty and their complicated pedegree.

I don't actually know anything about it, but I'm guessing that while "queen" can mean "female monarch" or "wife of a king", "king" only means "male monarch." Philip then, being the husband of the Queen (female monarch), is not a king but holds the title of Prince.

I think (not sure) that the Queen is the only or eldest child of the actual royal family. Prince Phillip, not actually being a royal, cannot be king, though he's promoted to prince by marrying the queen. The actual royal has to 'out-rank' the non-royal, and King is 'higher' than Queen.

Or is Prince Phillip her second husband? I could look it up, but I'm too lazy.

I don't really pay attention to the Monarchy. It's all just symbolic, they have no real power, they're just a waste of money.

I'm thinking that the correct answer is "try not to think about it." :)

oh boy.

its simple Prince Phillip married the Queen. The Queen was born to the british royal famaly and thus Phillip is the "prince" as well as God only really knows how many other titles. But to answer why it is so that we all know that the Queen out ranks her husband.

Spouces of monarchs ARE not of equle rank to the blood line. A Queen is not equle to a king unless there is no king, Queen is in essance the title given to the mother of the next in line to the thown. Queen Mother is the title given to whomever is in charge of the country. (don't get me started on the simantics)

The rank of raining monarch goes to the eldest son through male decendants to the eldest female. If all die, abdicate or whatever it then falls to the uncle OR the direct children (unless the "whatever" has something to do with blood line then it defauts back to the preivous kings Brother.)

hope that clears things up for you.

Elizabeth I didn't marry precisely so that she could remain monarch, I seem to recall. As for the present title of Prince Consort, we have Queen Victoria to thank for that.

Philip is of royal blood. He's also a Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, but from the Greek end of the family. But he's not close enough to the throne-line to be King. He's consort. In fact, we have rarely had 'king and queen' - the only example I can think of is Williamandmary, but this wasn't actually a king and queen. As any true historian knows, 'they' were in, in point of fact, an orange.

Wikipedia tells me there's been some discussion about changing the succession laws to reflect the fact that we no longer live in a paternal chauvinistic society, but there are two complications. One, due to the nature and structure of the Commonwealth, all the various Realms would have to change their laws at the same time to avoid successions of different people to different "crowns", and secondly there aren't any women in the senior line of succession (Chuck, Wills and Harry) so it doesn't actually make a difference at the moment.

Other European monarchies like Denmark* have either made these changes or are in the process of making them so that the Crown descends to the eldest child of the monarch, regardless of gender (it only took the Numenoreans about ten or twelve High Kings to figure this out).

* your mileage may vary. I don't have the Wikipedia article in front of me, so it might be Norway or Luxembourg or Belgium rather than Denmark.

So what about Charles and Camilla? Assuming that they don't skip his generation alltogether, will they be King and Queen once Elizabeth II passes away? Or is she barred as well?

Not to sound insensitive, but why do you guys care? Even if a bunch of you are Canadian, you guys split off almost a hundred years ago, right? And even for official British subjects, the royal family hasn't weilded any real power in hundreds of years, right?

Wrong

A:- the royal famaly still is the biggest land holder in the world. All the land of the common wealth and united kingdom is owned by the royal famaly. We only manage it (alright a little bit simplified but I can't be bothered looking it up)

B:-Every law has to be ratified by her magisty, requiring her signiture before it becomes legal... Though she cannot go against public opinion. The end result is a lot of back room politics and back yard tricks where her "Advisors" talk with the civil servants (who really run the place) and kill most of the REALLY bad tricks. (This, and many preivous, govenments use the media to sway public opinion, forceing her to agree before splitting the govenment and weakening the nation)

C:- End of the day ALL BRITISH AND COLONIAL troups answer to the Royal Family as they are the field marshals/ lords of the admeralty and all the rest. Once again they have to bow before the presure of the elected government as disruption will damage the whole countery.


The Queen is a stop gap in politics. Lets take an example:- Mr A. Hitler got into power by controling both the figure head and the paliment of germany (for you americans lets say the same party was both the President AND three quarters of the congress). From that possition he was able to force laws and maintain his own grip on power. After he was VOTED in to office.
The Queen (or any royal figure head) is what stops someone like Mr Hitler from getting too much power. So its a pritty good idea to have one.

So thats the power of our royal famaly. Now can we find something more interesting like Smallville (... like shooting fish in a barrel) or Doctor Who (rapidly heading the same way) ?

OH yes nate, you mentioned the fact the royals cost us money. 50 pence a year. Did you know that it cost EVERYONE in the United kingdom £10 to build the Millenium dome, good use of money that... How about the BILLIONS spent on the NHS (national health service) that went to consultants that couldn't tell a pre ganglionic fiber from a post ganglionic nerve? The fact that for his priviet holidays Tony Blair used the Royal plane (useing the very money you compain about the royals costing)? Shall I list the rest of the almighty cock ups or just shut up again?

I think I'll shut up

I was so busy ranting I missed this one

No. She will be the princess consort as Diana was the mother of the princes. Thus deserving of the title Queen. Camilla's decendants (unless from Charles... ugh) have no clame to the throne.

Ah, that is actually logical.

So if Diana were alive, she and Charles would qualify to be King and Queen?

No - she wasn't of royal blood. I think that's the case, anyway...

@InfImp: Canada, New Zealand, Australia, Fiji (I think), Malta (I think), Gibraltar (pretty certain), The Falklands (damned certain), possibly India and Pakistan, technically all Normandy [in reality, the Channel Islands only], and several other areas I don't remember all owe alleigance to the Queen. Her Majesty is still head of the Canadian Parliament, and technically still ruler of Canada (although in practice the Governor General (or Governor-General?) rules on her behalf and pays her some lip-service occasionally.)

To say nothing of historical, cultural and economic ties to Britain which are in some ways a lot stronger than with the USMA.

In political terms, the Queen, like the Lord Chancellor, is a convenient dohick that stops the whole pile of corrupt, greedy, insane, eccentric, money or power-grubbing, ambitious, obsessive/compulsives from collapsing and dragging the UK with it. She restricts the power of the Prime Minister, while Parliament restricts her power, and the Law Lords and the judicial system keep a close watch (in theory) on both of them.

Officially, the UK and the Commonwealth Realms (such as Canada) are in personal union - this means they are separate countries that just happen to share the same head of state.

In Canada, the Queen is represented by the Governor-General (a Canadian citizen selected by the PM since about 1953, and a female ethnic minority for the past ten years or so, but that's got nothing to do with anything). Officially, the GG summons and dissolves Parliament, gives royal assent to all pieces of legislation passed, and does all the ceremonial useless stuff that the PM doesn't have time to waste on. In practice, the GG is the PM's lapdog and does what s/he's told. After the King-Byng affair, the Supreme Court of Canada decided...uhhh...something. I don't recall the details, but the gist of it was for the GG to sit down, shut up and let the PM get on with the business of governing. The GG is largely a figurehead nowadays, despite being head of state and having a fancier house than the head of government (the PM).

One of the weirdest things for both Americans and Commonwealth citizens to wrap their minds around is that there are many, many, *many* countries with both a President and a PM. We're used to one or the other.

Do we really need watchdogs to stop dictators in democratic countries?

So all of these former British colonies and territories theoretically split off from the United Kingdom a hundred years ago, but they still bow down to the Royal Family? So they're independent nations...how? They sound like they're trying to have it both ways. Downright shady if you ask me.

If they have the same head of state then they can't be separate countries. That's absurd.

Okay, in bygone days InfImp would've been better than the alternative, but Zeke altered the code and everything. It's Nate or NTG now. I suppose it's meant as a term of affection, and it's not THAT bad...

There's precedent. Before George I became King of the United Kingdom, he was the Elector of Hanover. When he became King, the UK and Hanover entered into personal union, but remained separate entities, in that laws passed in one didn't affect the other. Similarly, England and Scotland were separate countries in personal union from the time James IV of Scotland became also James I of England up until the Act of Union in 1707.

Canada became a Dominion in 1867 - a collection of British colonies and territories were granted responsible government under the Crown. This meant that we had our own Parliament and were able to pass our own laws while still being part of the Empire. What at the time was a polite fiction became fact in the 30s with the Treaty of Westminster - the Dominions were indeed independant nations capable of conducting their own international affairs. The difference can be seen in WWI and WWII. In 1914, the Canadian PM considered the British declaration of war on Germany to be binding on Canada. In 1939, we made a point of arguing about it for a week before we declared war on our own.

Yeah, sorry. The whole "we're independent, really!" deal with Canada is hard to swallow for most Americans. We've had the word "freedom" crammed down our throats so much as children that we can't imagine that sort of leash being pulled by another country, no matter lightly. Exceptions are certainly made for freedoms limited by our own leader(s).

Yeah. I think the Samantha Bee segments in America: The Book summed it up best.

Read it, heathens.

The distinction that nobody realises is that Canada isn't part of the UK, Canada shares a monarch with the UK. When she's over here, she's Queen of Canada. Furthermore, she's a reigning monarch but not a ruling monarch, which means she doesn't get to pass laws. Further furthermore, she's delegated her authority to the Governor General, which means all we ever see of the old girl is her face on the money and stamps.

As for "bowing down", nuh-uh. I bend my knee to nobody, even if she does remind me of my grandmother. There's even talk of removing the line in the Oath for new citizens about pleding alliegance to the Queen. She's blood kin, actually. Go back 15 generations and there's a Maguire in the Queen Mum's ancestry. Of course, most of the population of the British Isles is as closely related or closer.

Well, yeah. I get the whole UK/Commonwealth distinction. The thing that gets me though, is that -- as I understand it -- Canada itself was not the driving force in its "independence" from the UK. It sort of gradually over time, at a pace not particularly urgent, was mostly made a quasi-free and semi-independent nation. At least on paper.

We had twin rebellions in 1837-8 that were put down, but we were granted responsible government (that is, self-government) to keep us happy and non-rebellious.

The Treaty of Westminster came about because we felt that, given our sacrifices in WWI, especially at Vimy Ridge, we were a nation and it was about time we were recognised as one.

We didn't get our Constitution until 1982 (the repatriation of the British North America Act - basically it meant the piece of legislation that established the Dominion in 1867 was transferred from the UK to Canada so that we could be in charge of our own Constitution).

Our path to indepence was longer and a bit more sedate than yours, but the demand for change came from this side of the pond.

This is the King-Byng affair I was talking about earlier. I was wrong on a few details.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King-Byng_affair

Didn't we (Netherlands) at one point have the same king as some other country? I think it was Austria or something, but I'm not sure. But because there were different laws there, someone else inheritted it.

I think I know what you mean, but you don't need the same queen to be on a leash held by another country. Our politicians listen to the US government so much, that sometimes I wish I lived in France.

[quotes]Didn't we (Netherlands) at one point have the same king as some other country? I think it was Austria or something, but I'm not sure. But because there were different laws there, someone else inheritted it.[/quotes]

Sounds like the War of the Austrian Succession. Maria Theresa of Austria was named heir to the Holy Roman Emperor (her father), but half of Europe couldn't stomach the thought of a female ruler and the other half saw a chance to grab some territory by using it as a pretext.

It's scary having this much useless information crammed into my head.

"The distinction that nobody realises is that Canada isn't part of the UK, Canada shares a monarch with the UK. When she's over here, she's Queen of Canada. Furthermore, she's a reigning monarch but not a ruling monarch, which means she doesn't get to pass laws. Further furthermore, she's delegated her authority to the Governor General, which means all we ever see of the old girl is her face on the money and stamps."

So of what use is the Royal Family if all they do is act as part of a complicated set of checks and balances that could easily be accomplished in a better way through a system closer to the USs'?

Because we're not the US. We don't want to be the US (well, most of us). We've been arguing about Canadian Identity since Day 1, and about the only thing we can agree on is that we're Unamerican.

Put another way, this system works for us and it's too much effort to change it. Rather than get all worked up about it and pull everything up by the roots, we did the Canadian thing and politely pushed the old girl into the corner, where we can ignore her without being actively rude.

Ah, c'mon. You're America Lite.

Hmm.... More like America Ice, actually.

Europeans, of course, know that you indeed are Americans, but Canadians don't seem to like that thought. ;)

Nate: The way I see it, our queen at least, is more of a symbol than anything else. She does have some power that some of us think is already too much for a non-elected person, but it's not really significant.

America Ice. :)

I believe that would be Minnesota. Go Gophers!

Which is unfortunate because a negative identity isn't really an identity at all. I for one find our national attitude insufferably smug and self-congratulatory. That doesn't mean I don't love my country. I've always been very proud to be Canadian -- I'm just not always proud of what Canada stands for at a given time. Anyone in a democracy has that problem sooner or later.

You realize that not bowing to her would be actively rude, right? I'm no fan of the monarchy either (it's a long-running debate in my family; I'm on my dad's side). But she is the Queen of Canada and our head of state. If you don't like that, you don't just pretend it isn't true, you work to change it. And we should -- I respect Elizabeth enough to suppress my small-R republicanism, but I have no interest whatsoever in being a subject of Charles.

She puts on her knickers the same way I do, one leg at a time. I just don't have a flock of maids helping me. I've got a cheeky egalitarian streak: I called the PM by his first name to his face (he wass on my TV all the time, so I felt like I knew him). That and my (heavily diluted) Irish blood and my sense of contrariness keep all my joints locked in the upright position...not that it matters, 'cause I doubt I'll ever meet the monarch again.

She was driven right past me at the '94 Commonwealth games. I got a brief flash of a little old lady in the back of a fancy car, and then she was gone.

What does the Queen actually do? I mean, her personally. Has SHE actually done ANYTHING?

It might also be the War of Spanish Succession, the North American aspect of which was known by the English colonists there as Queen Anne's War.

(Both are now thought of by Americans (when they bother to think of them at all) as just part of the French and Indian Wars. Is all how you look at it.)

Ain't it, though?

Hm, perhaps.

She's always been someone who presents a very neutral face and works very much behind the scenes, which is why she's generally considered to have been a rather sucessful monarch. Charles, on the other hand, has some worried because he's been very much the opposite thus far. This is the guy that publically snubbed the Chinese by not turning up at a state function, which is one heck of a way to run a country. It's just not done, you know?

I'm not really a fan of the whole royal family idea (In the way that most people are not 'fans' of smallpox). They cost money, they get privilege they really do not deserve and there's probley a bit of jealousy thrown in too.
But the only thing I think they've got going is the whole adding 'Royal' to front of things.
We haven't got just a navy. We've got 'The Royal Navy'.
It's not the mail service. It's 'The Royal Mail'.
*Question in a question..... Its the Royal Navy and the Royal Airforce....why not the Royal Army?*
On the first question, I just though it was all down to the order of things. If there's a Queen and she marries, he can't be King cos he would outrank her, so he's a Prince. If there is a King, he can have a Queen.... she won't affect him. If the King gets run over by a bus or whatever, the oldest son or daughter becomes the reigning monarch, not the tart the king married. So there was no point in her driving that bus over him, she won't be the ruler.
We had:
Edward and George
Eddie was the oldest, but he sodded off to marry a American woman (She couldn't be queen cos she had been divorced - Simpson something)
So George was King. He had a wife Queen 'Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon' and two Daughters 'Elizabeth' and 'Margaret'. When he died, his wife ('Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon') became the 'Queen mother' as she couldn't be the ruler (Not special enough, you see). As the oldest, Elizabeth became our Queen. Or Queeny as she likes to be known.
Bit sucky though, eh? Just because you're born later, you never get to be King?

Tell that to:

Aragon,
Castile,
Navarre,
The Basque Territories,
Granada,
The 17 Provinces,
Milan,
Most of Southern America
in the Sixteenth Century. It's called monarquia, bub.

I will refer to you by this anachronism for as long as you keep asking me not to.

And I refuse to refer to you as 'great' :p

*snerf*

Wallis Warfield Simpson. Something of an opportunist, by reputation.

In the sixteenth century I don't think any of those called themselves separate countries, at least not in earshot of England.

So I wandered over to the Wikipedia line of succession page, and found it most interesting.

1. There are way more kings and queens still "active" in Europe than we think.
2. All of them are somehow in the lines of succession for each other.
3. The rules about who can be king are very strict.
4. Somebody has way too much time on their hands calculating this stuff, because there are thousands of entries that will NEVER be King. They'll be dead before the list works its way down to them.

Thank Victoria Hanover/Saxe-Coburg-Gotha for that whole mess as to who-is-related-to-whom.

The exception AFAIK is Juan Carlos.

And in the sixteenth century, no-one gave two hoots about England, except the Pope and the King of Castile, the King of Aragon, the King of Navarre, the King of Seville (basically, the King of Spain), because Drake kept burning his ports/annoying his ships.

And yes, they did call themselves separate countries. The 17 Provinces, for example, did not count themselves as part of Spain. Nor did Castile consider itself part of Aragon or Navarre part of the Basque.

The King of Spain still holds 21 Kingly titles, some of which are actually in Spain.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of..._Spanish_Crown

These Spaniards seem to be packrats as far as titles are concerned. Most of those titles used to be Hapsburg possessions and haven't been Spanish for centuries. I think they bought the other half at aristocratic rummage sales - not the territories, just the titles.