Talk:Republicanism in the United Kingdom/Archive 1

implications of future events
Under the arguments against the monarchy was the following statement: "The UK is one of the most secular and religiously appathetic countries in the world, yet has a Christian head of state. In the future, this is likely to be even more discriminatory as the demise of religion in the United Kingdom becomes greater." As the last sentence is speculative at best and biased at worst, I have removed it. Current trends away from religion are not enough to suggest those trends will continue. Ærin (talk) 18:08, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

discrimination section
George Bush was not elected because his father was the President. He was elected because We the People of the United States wanted him as the President. This is what we fought the Revolutionary War over, and much American blood has been spilled in the name of this concept. Noble birth has no value on American soil. So, please, British subjects, have some respect for the American Constitution and those who gave their lives for it, and don't imply that the President of the United States has been elected for any reason other than what the Constitution says: We The People wanted him. btw I voted for John Kerry in 2004. However, George W. Bush is still the properly elected President of the United States of America, the greatest Nation in the history of the world. Long Live the American Revolution. 71.121.3.250 06:19, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

Polls
There have been quite a few changes to the poll percentages over the last few weeks. I would appreciate it if editors could justify any figures by providing their sources on this page before making any more changes. That way we can quickly become confident that the reported poll figures are real poll figures rather than propaganda put out by the republicans or the monarchists. -- Derek Ross 00:33, 25 Feb 2004 (UTC)

The percentages are changing all the time, so I put the highest and lowest figures in to give an impression of the range of public opinion. G-Man 01:11, 25 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I've no problem with that (in fact I guessed that you might be doing so). All I'm saying is that when new figures come in from new polls, it would give the reader more confidence in the figures, if they knew which poll they came from. -- Derek Ross 05:49, 25 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Someone wake up around here. Please see the classical definition of republic and republic article. Things have been redefined and you need to get a handle on it and relink some words.WHEELER 21:08, 23 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I have been looking through the British republican web sites referenced on this page and I've been unable to find the answer to one question. How do republicans propose to handle the possibility that at the time Britain becomes a republic there might continue to be other countries who have the British monarch as head of state? Most, if not all, Commonwealth realms defer to British law for rules of succession. If Britain ceases to be a monarchy, those countries would be put into a constituional crisis. The Governor-General could not act as the representative of a monarch if no monarch existed.

It's likely that most of the Commonwealth realms will become republics before Britain but with 15 others it's possible that there would be one or two that don't get around to it in time. I'd like to see some discussion of this issue as part of this article.

Ben Arnold 11:59, 13 Feb 2005 (UTC)


 * Why are all the links of this page for pro-republican organizations? In order to obtain NPOV, shouldn't there also be links to those groups with an opposing viewpoint? (Bruce Cabot)


 * Yes, there should be. I nominate you to find and add them!  8^)   --Spudtater 12:00, 10 November 2005 (UTC)


 * As regards the position of Commonwealth realms, Malcolm Turnbull of the Australian Republican Movement did say in his 1993 book The Reluctant Republic that if Britain were to become a republic before Australia, its president would become sovereign of Australia. Bit like the President of France being Co-Prince of Andorra??  Quiensabe 14:41 20 January 2006


 * There is the remotest of possibilities that as a formal Federal Republic with a written constitution Britain could possible reverse the trends of small state breaking away. That would be ironic - Prince Charles dreams of restoring Great Britain to her former glory,1 or so he says on his web page.  If his stepping down to create a Federal Republic with an elected head of state and a written constitution were part of the solution it is difficult to imagine he would support that.  Sandwich Eater 03:47, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

POV
This looks a bit POV and unsourced to me, with phrases such as "The campaign group Republic has been taking manipulative advantage of royal events in recent years" and "However, the effect of the jubilee celebrations was diminished following the collapse of the Burrell case and allegations surrounding the household of the Prince of Wales". I'll try and read up a bit more on British republicanism, but I'm not very informed on the subject at all. This article does need some clean up to remove both monarchist and republican POV in the article to make it better reflect NPOV. Talrias (t | e | c) 20:26, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

I can't really offer any suggestions on how to improve this article, but I have to say that it reads less like an encyclopaedia entry and more like an advert for the republican movement. I assume there's an article on republics and republicanism in general, and although there is scope for tackling issues around Britain's monarchy in particular (the Constitutional status of Commonwealth countries if the monarch is removed has been mentioned, for example), I can't help feeling that the article is, if anything, more in-depth than it needs to be. That there is a republican movement active in Britain, and that support for a republic currently stands at around XX-XX% of the population, seems to be all that is really required here. - Adaru 13:57, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

Hmm, the "Arguments in favour of an elected monarchy" appears to be one selected group of ideas of how an elected Monarchy could come about with statements like "They will represent their country for a limited five or ten years because they deserve to.". Why 5 or 10 years? and "We don't need an outdated inherited monarchy to continue using national treasures for state purposes." etc and it specifically refers to the office of US President twice as a de-facto benchmark for republicanism. This is veering towards 'original research' Hence I have stuck a NPOV tag on the section. Pigeonshouse 17:48, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

pigeonshouse, ack you wrote this a year ago so you probably won't read what I'm writing. oh well. I was just going to say that, the United States is the only country which has been a free, pluralistic, democratic Republic since 1776. So that would be a good reason for us to be the model of a Republic. There are others, Taiwan, Greece, etc., but they haven't been this way continuously since 1776. Only the USA has. << waving the American Flag >> Yes, we have our flaws, all countries do, but we're the oldest and in the opinion of patriotic Americans, still the best.71.121.3.250 06:26, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

Conservative republicans?
I'm not suggesting that being a conservative and a republican in Britain is an oxymoron, but are there any Tory MPs who have spoken in favour of a republic? Many still find the idea of an elected upper house hard enough to stomach! In Australia there is support for a republic on the right as well as the left, but in Britain, it is almost entirely centre-left, which is why it may be less successful. (Plus the fact that the Queen of Great Britain is a British person living in Britain, whereas the Queen of Australia isn't an Australian living in Australia, which is more likely to rouse nationalist sentiment on the right in that country.) Quiensabe 14:41 20 January 2006

This is from Republic's Imagine magazine "It may come as a surprise to some,but Republic does have members and supporters who are also paid up members of the Conservative party. Following on from Republic’s successful attendance at the Lib Dem and Labour party conferences some attention is now being turned to how best to attract those on the right who are disaffected with the monarchy. Graham Smith explained, “Campaigns like this are won when a substantial section of conservatives are convinced of our cause. One of the tasks ahead of us is to develop ways of communicating our message in a way that will appeal to the broadest political spectrum and therefore attract people from the right, centre and left of British politics.” Graham is asking any conservative supporters to get in touch, to help develop ways of targeting this key audience. “If we can appeal to those elements of the conservative tradition that are in line with republicanism then we can begin to make real progress in broadening our support base,” Graham concluded". I doubt that many Tories are republicans, but it's quite possible in the meritocratic US style republican groups, which probabaly do exist. Paj.meister 21:48, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

It hasn't really occured to that many people if a quick internet search can be trusted. An internet search on torries and republican yields only comparisons between the US conservative party and the Conservative party. Here is an Economist article1 questioning why the success of the US version of the conservative party out performed the UK version so drammatically. There could be many, many reasons for that of course. But no one seems to question the idea that Republican conservatism would have an advantage over aristocratic/monarchist conservativism. The idea of decoupling class warfare from fiscal or social conservativism must not be very common in the UK. Sandwich Eater 03:47, 1 September 2006 (UTC)


 * It's been a while but there are some trends towards republicanism, but they don't manifest themselves much. However there has been a shift over time and with conservatism in the UK increasingly defined in terms of positions on the state, economics and public services, there is no particular reason why all Conservative members should automatically be monachists. The "From Estate Owners to Estate Agents" is a very telling comment about the change in the party over decades. I should also add that there's a difference between being an ardent supporter of the monarchy and happening to think it's okay/not worth the hassle of changing but not something to go out of the way to help.


 * As far as conservatives who'd support a republic go, very few regard the issue as being remotely a priority but amongst the reasoning that comes up in conversation:


 * The actions and style of the Blair government in particular have left many wondering about whether the checks and balances in the system (some of which, like the old composition of the House of Lords, have been removed) really do function as well as previously assumed. Would "President Blair" have been possible if there actually was a President? Of course a written constitution may also solve this and I suspect this would be the preferred option but to be honest neither is remotely near the forefront of constitutional discussion and priorities.
 * Then there's the perceived inevitability factor. Again recent constitutional changes have not really been inputted by the right and have left them fulminating against the results (the West Lothian Question, the position of the House of Lords etc...) and if the monarchy is felt to be doomed then rather than fighting a battle that will be lost, it may be preferable to be able to have influence over the form of a republic. But of course the extent to which this is regarded as inevitable is highly varied.
 * Some are worried about the position of the Established Church, especially if/when Prince Charles succeeds. If forced to pick between Church and Crown, some may pick the Church and support removing the Crown as a tactic to preserve the Church. (But since most republicans tend to support disestablishment this is not going to generate common cause.)
 * Plus some of the personalities involved, particularly Charles, can result in scratching heads.
 * "Just imagine... President Thatcher!" may be a good slogan for left-wing monarchists, but can evoke a very different reaction in some quarters on the right.
 * Remember also that it was a Conservative Prime Minister who oversaw the Abdication when making it clear Edward VIII could not have both Wallis Simpson and the throne - what is that if not a limited form of republicanism?


 * I don't want to mispaint a picture of a small republican core as it's not organised and the various different reasons are based on premises that not all Conservatives would agree with (e.g. reverence for the Church or Thatcher - indeed those two were not terribly compatible). A combination of "it ain't broke so don't mend it" and "don't care" is far more stronger than any active republican feeling. Timrollpickering 08:48, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

The reason why one cannot find republican Tories is because the raison d'être of the Tory Party is to support monarchy. Republicanism and Toryism are fundamentally incompatible. It is like saying one is a "socialist capitalist" or a "anti-environment green".--Johnbull 02:08, 26 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Yes but we're not talking about Tories, we're talking about Conservatives and the two terms are not synonomous. The Conservative Party does not have as its raison d'être monarchism as that is not an active issue in current UK politics around which parties divide. (And conservatives in other countries are not always monarchists - the Liberal Party of Australia has its fair share of republicans.) That's a very different thing from socialists and environmentalists. Timrollpickering 17:11, 26 September 2007 (UTC)


 * I think my point still stands. I certainly do think that the Conservative Party's fundamental tenets are preserving the UK's constitutional traditions and national identity (including monarchy), this is what they have traditionally stood for. Conservatives abroad may well think differently, but this article is about British republicanism and inherent in conservatism is preservation of peculiar, distinct, national traditions and identity. I have never heard of a British Conservative being a republican.--Johnbull 00:40, 30 September 2007 (UTC)


 * There's some republican sentiment expressed at http://conservativehome.blogs.com/columnists/2007/07/andre-lilico-sh.html even if the author is arguing for an "elective monarchy", which no-one can see the difference to a republic. ConservativeHome is not exactly an obscure site. As for the Conservatives' fundamental tenets, in recent years far more emphasis has been placed on economics and individualism rather than defence of traditions that are not under threat, and the increasing internationalisation of ideology has meant that some aspects of Conservatism have become very detached from traditions. Thatcherism, for example, rode roughshod over traditions where they were perceived as wrong, and many Thatcherites would not be out of place in the US Republican Party. I'll just post my comments from that thread:


 * Certainly whenever people have tried to define what a [UK] "conservative" believes, it is very rare for "principled support for the continuation of monarchy" to be listed. "If it ain't broke don't fix it" is by no means the same.


 * There are some republican sentiments but hardly anyone considers it a priority (that may change under Charles) and potentially quite a lot of apathy who won't fight to keep it when others want to tear it down. Timrollpickering 10:09, 30 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Thatcherism actually halted devolution (and reversed the non-Thatcherite Heath's endorsement of it) and halted the abolition of the House of Lords for eighteen years (and Thatcher resurrected the hereditary peerage). That is an interesting link, and I see there is quite a lot of support for the idea that one cannot be a British Conservative and a republican. Trevor: "A central tenant of being a Conservative, is showing loyalty to the institution of monarchy". Malcolm: "am stunned that it should emanate from a Conservative". Bagehot: "if you don't support the British Monarchy you're not a British Conservative". A H Matlock: "Let us remember that we are Conservatives". Ash Faulkner: "Support for the monarchy is not universally conservative, because there is no such thing as universal conservatism. You seem to think there is which, in itself, is unconservative". Londoner: "Do we believe in a constitutional monarchy? Yes. Is such belief a key tenet of British Conservatism? Yes". Richard: "Seeing as the Tory Party was traditionally the party of the Monarchy it's a pity this isn't emphasised more. Was support for the Monarchy explicit in Built to Last? If not it should have been". Sepoy Agent: "I thought this was supposed to be a Conservative blog". I guess it now comes down to point of view since there are those who label themselves Conservative but who actually hold deeply anti-Conservative views.--Johnbull 14:31, 30 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Thatcher realised what any radical government has realised - devolution and reform of the upper house both redistribute power away from a Commons majority make it harder for a radical government to achieve bold controversial things. (And Thatcher's ressurection of hereditary peerages was limited - of the three she conferred, one should have been conferred twenty years earlier when they were still given out and the other two were to men without sons, so in practice were life peerages. I think Thatcher's motivation may have been rather more about getting a title for her son than anything else here...) Yes people made the case for Conservatives being strong supporters of the monarchy, but as you quote it hasn't been in recent policy documents (or for that matter on membership cards). And some of those posters played the Conservative equivalent of Godwin's Law - "if you don't support this view you're not a Conservative" as a poor substitute for debate. Timrollpickering 15:28, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

Proposed move

 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section. 

The result of the debate was move. &mdash; Nightst a  llion  (?) 08:26, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

There is a book by a welsh Tory republican called "Sons of the Romans" published 1970's 81.104.169.34 19:28, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Requested move
British republican movement → Republicanism in the United Kingdom – I think this should be at the latter. It focuses on history of republicanism and current movements and is a more suitable title.

Republicanism in the United Kingdom → Republicanism in Great Britain. The fact of using a strong political name supporting the monarchy is plainly against the reasons of the movement. The use of political name (United Kingdom, Democratic Republic of Germany, People`s Democratic Republic of Korea, etc.) instead of geographical ones is a way of supporting political causes (like the monarchies or the comunist dictatorships).

Voting

 * Add *Support or *Oppose followed by an optional one-sentence explanation, then sign your vote with ~ 


 * Support. Talrias (t | e | c) 21:49, 26 January 2006 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Why is Northern Ireland different?
"Unlike in the rest of the UK, republicans in Northern Ireland, whilst also subscribing to the removal of the monarchy and its replacement with a president in respect of Northern Ireland, also usually subscribe to the view that the replacement should be with the institutions of the Republic of Ireland."

There is no sense at all in this sentence. Republicanism is a wide and fractured movement, and while some Welsh republicans merely wish for the opportunity to elect a head of state, there is also a campaign for creating a Welsh republic which is separate from the UK. The above quoted sentence is misleading because it implies that only Northern Irish republicans desire an alternative to the "Republic of Great Britain". In reality a British republic is at variance with the goal of many Welsh, Scottish and even English republicans too. [This is one of the first results on a google search for example: http://www.aign.co.uk/leanne_wood_a060211.html]

This is very true, however I think the main point being made in the sentence is that Republicans in Northern Ireland generally wish to become part of the Republic of Ireland, rather than a "Republic of Northern Ireland" or part of a "Republic of Great Britain". In that sence, Northern Irish Republicans could perhaps more accuartely be described as "Irish Unionists" - i.e. in favour of a united Ireland independent of Great Britain. Of course such a description would ineveitably lead to confusion with Northern Irish Unionists who wish for Northern Ireland to remain part of the United Kingdom. - Michael Gibson


 * More less.. Irish Republicans wish to be part of a republic with NO political ties to Britain, kingdom or republic. 86.12.251.37 17:10, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

I’m sure there are some in NI that believe that perhaps a United Republic of GB & NI would be a less divisive way forward as there are some in England that believe that a separate republic of Wessex, for example, may be the best way forward. I think the point that should be made in the article is not that republicans in NI necessarily have a different view to those in GB but that the USE OF THE TERM republican when in connection to NI has extra connotations that it does not have when used in connection to GB. On a side note perhaps it should be pointed out that one of the key advantages of the monarchy is seen as the fact that people don’t trust an elected politician as head of state (i.e. with police, army etc directly answerable to him/her) and feel safer having parliament ‘kept in its place’ with the guarantee that the monarch can dissolve it and call an election should the situation arise. The most common argument I have found is the “Would you trust Blair or Thatcher as president”.

POV tag?
Is it still necessary to tag this as a POV article? It seems fine to me, and the dispute was some months past. Wally 19:25, 18 May 2006 (UTC)


 * It has definatly improved, however the article still makes very little use of references. Dubious, generalised, claims also need tiding up, statements such as "However, the effect of the jubilee celebrations was diminished following the collapse of the Burrell case and allegations surrounding the household of the Prince of Wales.", require sourcing from mainstream academia/media or else they fall under No original research.


 * I think there is also an arguement that only one side of the story (with no counter-arguements) is presented although I am not sure how this can be addressed without including detail which is irrelevant for this article. The wording in certain sections is not very neutral either, with a definate republican POV, although it is much better now than at times in the past. Canderra 00:44, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

Cromwell
The part aboot Cromwell seems really POV. To say he did not accept the crown because it would limit his powers and becdause of no love for republicanism. That's highly debatable.(Halbared 09:48, 7 June 2006 (UTC))


 * Most of that entire section is simply a collection of POV statements. Hence the lack of any citations. Canderra 10:45, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Most of the objectors' statements here seem quite POV, as no arguments provided, aparat from anti-royalism.

Flag
There should be something about the 19th century Republican tricolour flag -- see http://fotw.net/flags/gb}rep.html etc. Churchh 08:21, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Proposed merge of Republican Monarchist Debate
Re: the above, IMV the information from the article Republican Monarchist Debate should be merged here. --Lholden 00:40, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Agreed Brian | (Talk) 06:22, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Disagree... I think there is a need for an international one. The Canadian page and many other pages could move the point/counterpoint section to a central article, reference that, and retain UK-specific points et cetera. Sandwich Eater 11:44, 31 August 2006 (UTC)


 * Your arguments from the discussion on the debate page are pretty compelling. Perhaps it is easier to merge with the nation-specific articles so that editors and reader need not worry about the many differences as they manifest in various nations.  OK let's merge it.  i think I was the only dissenter.  Sandwich Eater 16:42, 31 August 2006 (UTC)


 * DISAGREE - What are the reasons for merging ? The only one thing might say would be so that all information is in one place.  I disagree - just a link to a seperate page would be sufficient.

Written Constitution
Is the adoption of a written constitution linked to the Republican movements in the UK? If so should there be a small section on that with links to the UK Constitution page? Sandwich Eater 03:49, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
 * I don't think so, I know of no groups linked to say "Republic" that advocate such a change. --Lholden 04:30, 1 September 2006 (UTC)


 * I had noticed the reference to the Bill in the article Commonwealth_of_Britain_Bill. Sandwich Eater 14:20, 1 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Well that's true, but they aren't one in the same issues. The State of Israel, for example, is a republic with no written constitution. --Lholden 22:48, 1 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Good point. One learns something new everyday with wikipedia.  I had no idea Israel had no constitution.  I can't imagine life without one.  But, it appears, the world does keep spinning for both the UK and Israel.  Sandwich Eater 23:33, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Charles
OK so on the Prince's own web page he admits there is no consitutional role for the Prince. Then he creates one for himself, and then St. James's palace even defends that role. Then I thought there was really not a lot of sourceable material defending his non-role but then CNN has this reference: CNN Link. So I am simply bewildered by this paradox. On the one hand you have monarchists that enjoy the ceremonial role of the broader royal family to attend events and help the queen, and on the other you have this attempt to claim the monarchy is impartial and consitutionally bound. Sandwich Eater 02:48, 6 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Charles hasn't created any constitutional role for himself - he can't. He, and the broader Royal Family, can represent the Queen at her, or her government's, request, and he can undertake charitable work on his own accord; but he still remains a subject of the Crown, not a part of it.  It is his mother who is bound by convention to practice politically impartiality, and though one would expect Charles, as the future king, to do the same, he is bound by no law or convention to do so until he takes the Throne.
 * Beyond that, there's a difference between promoting organic farming or commeting on architecture, and publicly endorsing a political party or supporting a government action. There's also a difference between private communication and public announcement.  The Chinese state dinner, however... well, he may have come close to crossing the line with that one, but there's still, technically, nothing wrong with it. --gbambino 15:59, 6 September 2006 (UTC)


 * It's confusing that his website has lines like "The Prince, as the 21st holder of the title in 700 years, has created a new role through which to serve the nation." as opposed to "The Prince has adopted the followin roles as an ordinary subject of Britain."Sandwich Eater 16:23, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Arguments
It seems that arguments for the monarchy have been littered with counter arguments and assumptions.

It seems to me that the "Arguments in favour of a republic" are actually just anti-monarchy arguments. Not one says what benefit a republic supposedly has, but all say what a monarchy supposedly is not. Shouldn't the section therefore be completely reworded? --gbambino 15:50, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
 * I agree (wow!) --Lholden 21:42, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
 * I agree and disagree - we need to stay true to reflecting primary and secondary sources and we need to watch out for creating original work. My perception is that Republicans (other than a few loud-mouths) are already fond of liberal, democratic constitutional monarchy and proud of Britain's role in shaping that.  They see a Republic as the next step and their arguments stem from that.  They don't bother so much talking about why a Republic is better than despotism, absolute monarchy, stalinist communism, or fascism - they talk about how it is an improvement over constitutional monarchy.  So I agree but also caution that such a restructuring should be accompanied by lots of citations and references.  In the monarchy section it might be fair to cite a bunch of the negative, royal-bashing, anarchistic sorts of groups and dicuss the unease that gives monarchists, particularly with the negative experiences of the english civil war and the IRA conflicts.  I drew heavily on a monarchist site to draft the original debate argument wherein this sentiment was certainly reflected - the feeling that some in the media are just loud mouth bashers.  I would definitely say monarchists seem to feel that there is some hooliganish system bashing that doesn't honour the traditions or value of the existing liberal democratic establishment for its good points. Sandwich Eater 00:49, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Your're certainly correct, I guess Gavin's point is that the article should make light of the benefits republicans expect from a British republic in arguing for one. --Lholden 01:18, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
 * I found this reference --> http://www.republic.org.uk/theissues/index.htm. At the bottom there is a "benefits of a republic" section. One could reference the success of other republics but that is difficult, it arouses national pride and it is difficult to prove the structure of government has anything to do with the success or shortcomings of the USA, Ireland, France, Germany et cetera.  Sandwich Eater 11:04, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
 * I added a "benefits" section. I propose Gavin could write a "basher" section on the monarchist side!  I was tempted to add that such a system might better support differentiation of the political parties in the UK more along the lines of ideals and less along social class lines, which I recall UK republicans claiming, but did not find a reference yet.Sandwich Eater 11:20, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Should the Monarchy argument section have arguments against A Republic and an elected head of state? Sandwich Eater 13:57, 7 September 2006 (UTC)


 * The problem is that rather than conveying information on any current or historical republicanism movements in the United Kingdom, certain editors are attempting to use this article to push their political views.


 * It is not that the pro-monarchy section should have arguments against a republic but that other section should not be focusing on arguments for a republic. These editors should also be reminded that Wikipedia is a factual encyclopedia, not a politics web-site; debating the pro's and con's of a current political issue is for websites which are designed for such.


 * If Unless one of the contributing editors' can justify the section's existance I am going to remove the section "Arguments_in_favour_of_constitutional_monarchy" and "Arguments_in_favour_of_a_republic", as they are conter to the encyclopedic nature of Wikipedia.


 * Although I wonder do whether the entire article isn't at risk of deletion by a tribunal considering it to be one of the many "political billboard" articles which have srung up recently on Wikipedia. Canderra 14:19, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

There are articles in encyclopedias regarding the conflicts between the 1800s issues between goldbacks and the silverbacks for example relating to currency. Those issues were contentious in their day, but can be reflected on with neutrality now. I would like to be able to go to an encyclopedic source to see a concise, non-polarized review of an issue. If both sides are able to keep it referenced to secondary sources and keep the point/counter-point balanced then it is neutral POV and not original work. I think it is valuable and helpful to be able to learn about something without having to go to partisan websites. I'll post a few examples here. Sandwich Eater 16:28, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Check out this example: Abortion_debate

If wikipedians can balance that they can balance anything! Sandwich Eater 16:30, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

I forgot to add that I had created a Request for Feedback on the original debate article and I believe I satisfied the one feedback provider who responded. His cautions were to aggressively require citations and avoid original work. Sandwich Eater 17:18, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
 * I think it would be very strange if contemporary political debate was regarded as 'unencyclopedic' within Wikipedia. That said, the history section of this article needs to be expanded I think. --Lholden 22:05, 7 September 2006 (UTC)


 * It quite simply is unencyclopedic to engage in political debate. Politics is by it's nature subjective, wheras the entire point of an encyclopedia is to present entirely objective facts. Stating when events in the debate occured and who they involved is fine but listing the pro's and con's of each side of the argument means that readers cannot be sure of the objectivity of the article. The Abortion Debate page is a perfect example of an article which belongs at politics.com.


 * I do find it amusing though to witness the amount of effort some people go to in order to present their POV on Wikipedia, if only they realised how few people actually read articles like this (who don't already have an unswayable POV) then they would realise their time would be a lot better spent joining a relevant political party and being political in the conventional way.


 * I had thought this article could objectively portray facts relating to the history of republicanism in the United Kingdom but if people are determined to turn it into a political debate page than I guess the article definatly belongs on the academic scrap-pile with the hundreds of other totally unencyclopedic "billboard" articles which inhabit the Politics_of_the_United_Kingdom Category (which appears below but for some reason won't link here).
 * It would have been nice to have heard your dissent during the merge proposal. We could have kept all of this on a separate page so that the history of the UK part would be separate from a page capturing current debate.  Anyway, I think it is nice to see both sides of a position discussed in a forum where both sides can edit it freely.  And the history of Republicanism in the UK is not the title.  The title of the article also implies that the future is discussed, and that is an inherently political topic.  Sandwich Eater 01:23, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
 * I can't agree with the above (unsigned comment). Any other encyclopedia would state the arguments of either side in a debate, and wouldn't be limited to a historic portrayl of the facts.
 * I also find it strange that if the above commenter thinks parts of this article are "unencyclopedic", the whole article should be deleted. --Lholden 01:54, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Arguments in favor of an Elected Monarchy
This section violates the following two points from the original research guideline:


 * It introduces an argument, without citing a reputable source for that argument, that purports to refute or support another idea, theory, argument, or position;
 * It introduces an analysis or synthesis of established facts, ideas, opinions, or arguments in a way that builds a particular case favored by the editor, without attributing that analysis or synthesis to a reputable source;

Please cite sources (as the other argument sections do) to rectify this. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 64.9.235.135 (talk) 10:13, 30 December 2006 (UTC).

Thailand Coup
Thailand's 19 sept 2006 coup a month prior to a planned election is eerily remeniscent of the fears of the cold-war era prime-minister who feared coup leaders in the UK had tacit support from the royal family. Does Thailand have a written constitution? What impact does this have on the perceived stability of constitutional monarchies globally? Is this an example of a king acting as a "fire extinguisher"? Looks like a big risk to democracy. Sandwich Eater 15:24, 20 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Too soon to say. Kings have played important roles in ending coups similar to this; most notably in Spain, Cambodia, and even Thailand itself.  I don't see what this has to do with UK republicanism, however. --gbambino 15:47, 20 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Good points on Spain and Cambodia. With regard to UK republicanism the link is that republicans have a tendency to worry that a monarch presiding over a liberal monarchy will revert towards despotism.  A big part of a monarchism/republican long term political-science sort of debate is the arguable role of copmeting monarchies in WWI contrasted with a lack of monarchy's equally arguable stabilizing force in the events leading to WWII.  So when one sees a lack of argument from a constitutional monarch, or a lack of constitutionalism from the monarch, and a coup a month before an election, one begins pondering the positive or negative impact of the monarchy, whether there was a written constitution, whether the soldiers swore an oath to uphold the constitution (like the USA) or if they swore allegiance to the monarch, et cetera.  Then there was the BBC article regarding new evidence that the UK prime minister almost had a Thailand type coup at the height of the cold war.  Sandwich Eater 17:36, 20 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Sandwich Eater: They had a written constitution. Gavin's right, on the one hand monarchies do suffer coups; on the other coups have been prevented by monarchs. I think it's actually a question of standing rather than the means by which one arrives at a Head of state. The President of East Timor only recently staved off the total collapse of his state, with the help of Australian and New Zealand soliders... the Beer Hall Putsch was beaten in Germany, etc. Um, what did this have to do with republicanism in the UK? --Lholden 23:46, 20 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Yes I realize he is right. But I am curious (and I thought discussion pages were OK for this sort of thing) do soldiers in the UK swear allegiance to the crown or to the constitution?  In Thailand they swore allegiance to the crown...  In the UK, there is the inherent instability warned of by various intellectuals, not the least of which was Lord Scarman see (Scarman Article).  Then there is this BBC article (BBC Article) and one sees how close Britain may have come to a coup quietly endorsed by the monarchy just as this one in Thailand appears to have been orchestrated.  Sandwich Eater 00:22, 21 September 2006 (UTC)


 * There's actually a book about it called The Leader which is set in 1935, in which Oswald Mosley and the BUF come to power with the implied consent of King Edward VIII. It's a fantasy, but a probable one. My understanding is that soliders in the UK swear allegiance to the Crown, I would be very surprised if that wasn't the case. --Lholden 00:36, 21 September 2006 (UTC)


 * That then could be a more defining difference between the US and UK consitutions, or that of France, Germany, or other secular Republics. Not only is the UK constitution unwritten, the executive branch does not swear allegiance to it. The Monarchy of the UK is only constitutional because political scientists have defined the term "constitutional" very, very loosely. (see UK Constitution).  Sandwich Eater 10:57, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

Institutional memory
Many years ago I skimmed The Downing Street years for a paper on Thatcher and I recall reading that she found her weekly visits to the Queen helpful because the Queen could impart the experience of having reigned through the terms of several prime ministers. I think I've even read Tony Blair saying much the same thing. I'm too far removed from it now though to feel comfortable adding anything about this to the article. Is this asserted royal contribution to the government's institutional memory worth mentioning? Greyfedora 07:47, 2 October 2006 (UTC)
 * If you can verify it, I think it's fine - obviously it must play a part in the PMs relations with the Queen. --Lholden 08:57, 2 October 2006 (UTC)
 * I agree that it's fine. I might be tempted to add something similar for past presidents in a term limit system that are also seen as politically retired.  The critical thing is to add a citation.  Sandwich Eater 14:29, 2 October 2006 (UTC)
 * I would not make the presidential addition; the Queen has a right to be consulted, past presidents are consulted at the whim of the administration. Septentrionalis 15:51, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
 * The monarch can demand an audience with the PM & lecture them on whatever she pleases? I didn't realize that.  I can't think of a political reason to complain about it, so unless the PM had some sort of political battle with the palace I can't imagine why they would say anything negative about it.  Can you imagine Thatcher or Blair saying something like "I just can't stand being summoned to the palace!  It's so boring and the Queen has nothing useful to say!"  In the process they would annoy the Queen's supporters and probably gain little from her detractors.  I can't imagine a saavy PM complaining about the duty of meeting with the head of state, or any of their constitutional duties.  Any pensioner in Britain could chat with the PM about having lived through several PMs.  Of course the verb "reign" makes the advice more sage I suppose, and the head of state does conduct a bit of diplomacy and stately relations during their reign that might make them more informed than others.  So for those reasons IMHO it might not be so important, but, If you can find the citation it still seems like fair game to me and could be included in the inst. memory arguents.  Sandwich Eater 17:19, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Citations needed
Some of these tags are really unneccesary. While there is no citation, one in most places is hardly necesary as either the sentence is stating the obvious or simply outlining an argument one might make, rather then stating a fact one way or another. They make the article look shoddy and scruffy and serve no meaningful purpose.

To sum up, I am in favour of getting shut of the monarchy and moving them to a council house in Leicester, so by definition I am a Republican, and I would argue most of them points, therefore that is proof that at least one Republican would make such arguements. Mtaylor848 (talk) 22:25, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

Removal of UK
I question the accuracy of the editor who removed the UK with the comment that it is anachronistic, and replaced it with "England". I looked at the UK page and I do not see anything relating to the formal abandonment of the word UK and I'm not really clear that it should be changed to England at this point, unless there is something I don't understand about the latest federalist moves devolving state parliaments for Scotland et cetera. Can someone clarify? Sandwich Eater 16:42, 2 October 2006 (UTC)


 * I don't think references to the UK are anachronistic as the UK still exists. Personally, I think this page should be called Republicanism in Britain, because a republican United Kingdom would be an oxymoron. Quiensabe 01:34, 10 October 2006 (UTC)


 * I suppose that would be more correct linguistically. But even if the name were to change from 'United Kingdom' to 'United British Republic' it seems to me that we're talking about the nation currently called the UK.  Sandwich Eater 02:55, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
 * Exactly. &mdash; Nightst a  llion  (?) 15:47, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Elective Monarchy
I just thought I would open the discussion on whether or not elective monarchy should be included in an article concerning Republicanism. I can't see that it is hurting anything, though it is a bit off course for a Republic vs. Monarchy article. Sandwich Eater 00:20, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
 * shrugs If you've got any kind of notable info on that, why not... &mdash; Nightst a  llion  (?) 15:12, 25 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Arguably, on the political science definition of a republic, an elective monarchy is a form of a republican state, thus it could be included. However, on the popular sovereignty definition of republicanism, an elective monarchy isn't a republic... and of course then there's the argument that the Presidential system is simply a form of elective monarchy. So really, there is no answer - if there is a proposal that is notable, then it could be considered. --Lholden 01:38, 26 November 2006 (UTC)
 * The whole section on Elective Monarchy seems unfounded to me unless someone can properly cite any or all of the arguement. Does anyone object to removing the section entirely?  --TrippingTroubadour 21:45, 27 April 2007 (UTC)
 * This charge that the section is silly in itself is quite POV. You cannot dismiss the idea of elected monarchy so easily.  A number of countries have had elected monarchies. Dogru144 23:01, 27 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm not dismissing the idea of an elected monarchy. I'm simply wondering if there is a significant movement for an elected monarchy within the UK.  Besides, this section within the article seems like one person's opinion rather than any well-established argument.  If it deserves to stay, it at least should be rewritten with expert references.--TrippingTroubadour 02:41, 28 April 2007 (UTC)

Republicanism amongst Ulster nationalists?
Ulster nationalism is admittedly small scale but have any of the groups advocating independence for Northern Ireland taken a stance one way or the other on the monarchy post independence? Timrollpickering 11:59, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

Tourism?
Has there ever been a study on the amount of money the Monarchy brings into the British ecomomy by being a tourist magnet? If so, should something about that be added to the "arguments for the Monarchy" section? Blueboar 18:50, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

It is irrelevant because France has no monarchy and Paris brings in 3 times as many tourists as London does. I doubt if there was no monarchy there would be a drop in tourists as tourists could go in and see the places that are now off-limits due to them being occupied. Tremello22 (talk) 20:36, 29 November 2007 (UTC)


 * As irrelevant and silly a point it is (and debatable if other countries have not problem), it is also one of arguments often made by monarchists (although precisely why the best system of government for a country should be determined by tourist revenue is beyond me...) and probably should be covered as it is one of the issues in the debate. Timrollpickering (talk) 18:41, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

Citation needed bias
in the section relative to the arguments against a monarchy several "citation needed" notices are found, while in the in favour of the monarchy there is not a single citation needed notice, as all of the section makes reference to national sentiments, behaviour and other questionable statements.--neolandes 04:32, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Both are nothing but personal essays. The fantastical inclusion of 'ethnicities' being created within crown family is just absurd. The lack of evidence or attachment to event or idea make it nothing but a nonsensical philosophic essay.

And its not even well thought out. I tried to delete it but unfortunately wikipedia is gay24.250.242.46 (talk) 02:24, 24 November 2010 (UTC)


 * Despite your casual homophobia, I have restored balance by including an unreferenced tag in the arguments for a republic. Famousdog (talk) 10:52, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

Thanks I'm on a personal quest to deal with two year old problems I find on wikipedia. My other quest is against the article historic recurrence which is something that should have been deleted two years ago but the editors forgot. I don't know how to delete articles, tried to propose deletion for historic recurrence but the personal-essay maintainer there took down the tag. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.250.242.46 (talk) 01:57, 25 November 2010 (UTC)

Arguments against monarchy
In this section there are numerous counter-arguments in the points against monarchy; these should surely belong in the arguments in favour of a monarchy" section.

Since this section of the article is dedicated to argument against monarchy, it surely it is not appropriate to have a counter-argument after each point; I suggest these be moved to the next section "arguments in favour of a monarchy", since the counter points are placing heavy a monarchist bias on the Against Monarchy points.

Eg: - (excerpts with inappropiate text in bold)

''Further, republicans argue that 'the people', should be sovereign, not the offspring of one family retained at public expense to occupy the nominally top job in a state system, permanently. This seems to disregard the legal doctrine that 'the people' are already sovereign due to the fact that the monarch personally embodies the state and the people.''

''Ceremonial parliamentary events can include a mass of obsolete customs and out of date procedures to enhance the appearance of legitimacy. Monarchical prerogative powers can be used to circumvent normal democratic process with no accountability, although these are invariably executed by elected government ministers, and not the monarch herself.''

''... It is also argued that having an anglican head of state is unrepresentative of a nation where the majority of citizens are non-religious. The UK is one of the most secular and religiously apathetic countries in the world, yet has a Christian head of state. Of course, such laws as these could be changed without abolition of the monarchy.''

''...so that daughters can enjoy the same rights as sons. However since absolute primogeniture is not used in the UK, females are less likely to become head of state than males. This method of succession not only disinherits daughters, but also her descendants. Again, such laws as these could be changed without abolition of the monarchy, as has happened in a number of other European monarchies.''

Prince Charles has spoken or acted in a way that could be interpreted as taking a political stance, citing his refusal to attend, in protest of China's dealings with Tibet, a State Dinner hosted by the Queen for the Chinese Head of State; his strong stance on GM food; and the contents of certain memos regarding how people achieve their positions which were leaked to the press.[8][9][10] Monarchists, however, point out that Charles should not be held to the same rules of impartiality as a Monarch as he has not yet assumed that role, as there is no formal, historical or parliament-approved role for the Prince of Wales, and thus he remains simply an individual subject of the Crown.[11]

''To some British Subjects, the monarchy may be considered an embarrassment, as a concept it is dated and while the UK has a hereditary head of state it can not claim to be a modern nation[citation needed]. '''However, such events as the Queen's Golden Jubilee and the funeral of the Queen Mother, which attracted crowds of Britons, hundreds of thousands in number, are testament to the belief that the majority of the British public is proud of their monarchy. Monarchists may also counter that other countries, such as Spain, Norway, Denmark, Sweden, Netherlands, Luxembourg and Japan, are also ruled by monarchs, and yet they, Japan in particular, are considered modern and well-working countries.' —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.17.74.237 (talk) 16:17, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

(kenwood2008)--Kenwood2008 (talk) 16:29, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Amendments
I've made a few amendments, hope they're ok;

1. Royal expenditure (arguments against Monarchy) hidden costs include Royal Security

2. Change from "British Subjects" to "Republicans argue..." in same section as is consistent with previous points

3. Points for the monarchy, have amended the sentence that said the British, Dutch and Danish monarchies have had 50 year spans with many Prime Ministers - only the British monarch has had this situation, the other two for less (although still substantial) amount of time

4. As noted by another user above, it is an inaccuracy to claim the George W. Bush presidency to have come about solely because his father was President; whilst this certainly might have influenced it, there is no evidence that it was wholly so.--Kenwood2008 (talk) 19:13, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

The title "Prohibition of Republican Advocacy" is wrong, and should be changed. Treason is treason. Call for the abolition of the monarchy by force is treason, as is calling for the abolition of the French Fifth Republic (or is it Sixth?) by force. This is not prohibition of advocacy, or anything close to it.JohnC (talk) 20:32, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

21st Century: Attorney General and the Guardian newspaper
"The Guardian newspaper approached the Attorney General in 2001, inquiring as to whether it would be prosecuted if it ran articles on the topic of whether British voters would have the right to chose a republic, as well as the abolition of certain laws relating to the monarchy. [2][3] The Attorney General refused to comment, so The Guardian published the articles anyway, then sued him" Sue him? is that right? i think that section in the 21st century is vandelism unless theres a source for it. Pro66 (talk) 23:48, 20 December 2008 (UTC)


 * I almost removed this paragraph when editing the preceding one - it doesn't seem add anything on the subject of Republicanism in the 21st Century, and smacks of vandalism. Anyone want to put the case for the defence?


 * On a semi-related note, I had a good look around for references on MORI polls for the following paragraph. The cited textbook was the best I could come up with, does anyone know of a more recent resource? Surely MORI have done more polls on this subject since 2005 but I can't find sources for them... any help appreciatedSplateagle (talk) 15:57, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

At the time it was suggested that as Parliament had brought itself into disrepute, the monarchy's status was higher. There is certainly no reason why the MP's scandals should result in an increase in support for a republic, or reason to link the two. In fact the latest independent polls show an increase in support for the monarchy. The Guardian has long campaigned for a republic - it is hardly to be expected that its readers would be monarchists. The Guardian poll is accordingly not relevant to the paragraph.JohnC (talk) 20:39, 8 November 2009 (UTC)
 * I agree. Anyone from the UK knows that both the Guardian and The Observer have a strongly left wing leadership, yet this is not evident to readers of this article from other countries, and makes it seem as though support for the monarchy has dropped massively in the past few years.  Either a note needs to be made of this, or we should delete the reference entirely.--84.92.91.13 (talk) 12:54, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

The green party of England and Wales
After research, the green party of England and Wales have a policy to 'scrap the British monarchy'. This would mean that they are currently the largest, British republian party. (TheGreenwalker (talk) 23:17, 30 October 2009 (UTC))

Irony of the coat of arms on this page
I think it's rather ironic that there is a huge picture of HM's government's coat of arms, crown and all, on a page on republicanism in the UK! Can someone get rid of it, it seems hardwired into a template of some kind that mere mortals can't change without deleting? So much for wikipedia being an encyclopedia anyone can edit...

Mu2 (talk) 16:10, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

Cromwell
This part is incredibly unbalanced and largely self-contradictory —Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.175.142.68 (talk) 14:29, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

Opening paragraph
I've removed from the lede a specific proposal that stems from this edit, because it doesn't seem to be any more fully referenced than any other idea. Obviously, there are many different ways in which a republic could, in theory, be formed. Ghmyrtle (talk) 10:09, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

Full Democracy
There is a widely acknowledged Democracy Index which classifies countries as full democracies, flawed democracies, hybrid regimes and authoritarian regimes. Monarchies appear in all these categories and indeed statistically constitutional monarchies are far more likely to be "full democracies" than republics are. In the light of this I've made the pro-republican bits rather more NPOV. Others might want to improve the pro-monarchy bits but I don't have time. NBeale (talk) 07:23, 2 June 2012 (UTC)

Ben Thackwray
Hello, I am not happy with the occupations of Thackwray as enumerated: this is not a commercial! One occupation should suffice here. Please let someone sort this out.Super48paul (talk) 10:47, 17 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I've removed him. He doesn't seem to be notable enough for his own article, so shouldn't be listed here.  Ghmyrtle (talk) 10:55, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

Flag removed
I just removed the following image from the top of the article: File:Flag of the British Republic.svg Its placement there seemed to me to give excessive attention to this basically made-up flag, which doesn't seem to have gained wide recognition or been used by any major organisation. It might be worth including some way down the article, but it doesn't merit being placed right at the top. Robofish (talk) 00:43, 15 February 2013 (UTC)

Out of context
I can note two major problems with this article:

- It is supposed to be about republicanism in the United Kingdom not about Republic vs Constitutional Monarchy. Such a comparison should be in another article. I would like to also point out that only half of the arguments used in the "debate" applies to the British monarchy in particular.

- Why on earth is there rant about the European Court of Human Rights? IT IS IRRELEVANT. This page is supposed to inform about Republicanism in the United Kingdom not about how you feel about European Institutions (I guess some British have written this article). While the point that the British Monarchy might safeguard more rights for British citizens than other international institutions like the E.U., European Court of Human Rights, the UN, ... might be true, singling out specifically a European Institution is very biased and does not inform more about the subject that this article is supposed to be about. (Mparusinski (talk) 09:56, 5 June 2012 (UTC))
 * I agree with Mparusinski about the inappropriateness of the lengthy arguments in favor of a republic and in favor of a constitutional monarchy in this article. At the very least, the arguments should only detail the positions for and against a republic since the article claims to be primarily about republicanism.  To be clear, I don't think an outright deletion of the arguments for a constitutional monarchy is necessarily in order, but they don't belong here; perhaps they should be moved to a new article formatted similarly to this one, called something like "Arguments for and against constitutional monarchy in the United Kingdom"?  I am hesitant to perform any substantial edits myself without support for such a change or alternative suggestions given the volatile editing climate surrounding these topics, but I think reworking and potentially relocating the argument section(s) would greatly improve the readability and neutrality of the article.  kristephanie TALK 20:15, 28 May 2013 (UTC)

Deletion of reference
As requested by the editor who deleted a reference, I have bought this to the talk page. I would have bought it here if I was deleting a 4 year old reference. I rolled back the edit as it seemed overtly political rather than explaining it then. (not that left-wing and monarchists are mutally exclusive). It was pointed out to me once that just because I dislike a source it does not make unreliable, but the reference deleted was from a survey in two national newspapers. Although I am not an expert on what makes a survey 'scientific', was the objection that it is a self-selecting survey, the number of respondants was higher than a lot of the other polls and the reference is clearly from the two papers not pretending it is anything else. Anyway I am going to return the page to how it was before the deletion subject to this discussion. That's my final point I'm not going to get into an argument Bevo74 (talk) 17:14, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

I see it has already been restored. Bevo74 (talk) 17:15, 18 April 2013 (UTC)


 * While I've no objection to being reverted, the way you reverted (marked as minor without a comment) was bad manners. Please don't make assumptions about my political views, which are irrelevant here. There are agreed standards for polling, laid out by the British polling Council. That is what I would call a "scientific poll", and every other poll quoted in that section will meet those standards. Anonymous online polls are conducted every day by newspapers of all persuasions (examples) and it's quite wrong to mix them up with the scientific polls. The latter actually claim to reveal something of public opinion in general, whereas the Guardian is honest enough not to make this claim. Incidentally, the Guardian and its Sunday imprint the Observer have never concealed the fact that they and their readers tend to be of a left-wing persuasion and I don't think there was anything tendentious or political in my original edit summary or my reasoning. --Lo2u (T • C) 17:43, 18 April 2013 (UTC)


 * Of the two reverting editors, one has so far failed to explain his objection to my edit, despite calling for discussion. The other has not responded to my explanation. Both appear to be editing elsewhere. I repeat, Guardian readers are a relatively small and extremely homogeneous group of people. A poll confined to Guardian readers tells us absolutely nothing about the standing of the monarchy or the popularity of Republicanism in general. At the moment the article suggests that there was a dip in support for the monarchy in the wake of the MPs' expenses scandal. That is a completely invalid and unreliable conclusion to draw from this information. I don't object to the inclusion of any material on Wikipedia unless it is unreliable. This is my only reason for removal and if there's no response, this will be removed. --Lo2u (T • C) 10:16, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

The reason I reverted the edit was, as said in my edit summary (16:43, 18 April 2013), "Reinstated sentences, which have been there for years." Is there a set length of time before sentences and references should be removed? There are many ones which go back over ten years. There is even one, "Brian Pearce, "The Queen Cult", in The Newsletter, 6 June 1959", is over fifty years old. Should they all be removed, leaving only more recent information in the article? Of course not. In the same edit summary I said "Should be discussed on talk page for its removal, if any." I should have said "I suggest should be discussed on talk page for its removal, if any." Incidently Lo2u, in your edit (08:50, 18 April 2013) you left the edit summary "Excuse me? I suggest you take this to the talk page and not mark the edit as minor. I fail to see how an unscientific readers' survey is relevant". Yet we didn't see you calling for a discussion; a discussion which was only started by Bevo74. In reply to Lo2u's earlier post above " I repeat, Guardian readers are a relatively small and extremely homogeneous group of people." Even minorities have the right to voice their opinions, and that it to be included in the article. Or don't minorities count? Unless there is a reason otherwise for the sentences/references in question to be removed, then the information should remain. HLE (talk) 16:47, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
 * The reason didn't answer to Lo2u's message on my talk page until now was that I didn't use my computer yesterday, never mind checking if there were any message on Wikipedia. Users should be given a number of days, at least, to reply to any messages. I do have a life outside of Wikipedia.
 * Thank you for getting back to me. Of course, I'm always quite happy to wait, but normally one would give a reason for reversion at the time of reverting, not two days later. It didn't have to be here; an edit summary would have done. I'm sorry but I really didn't follow your point about dates at all, and I have read it several times. I don't know where you got the idea that I believe older sources shouldn't be included. My main interest when I edited regularly was classics and many of the sources I added were several thousand years old. Regarding minority opinions, actually they don't count as much as majority ones on Wikipedia. That is made clear in WP:WEIGHT. Please would you now address, or at least acknowledge, my concerns that a survey of the readers of one newspaper can't be a reliable indicator of the status of republicanism. --Lo2u (T • C) 17:21, 20 April 2013 (UTC)


 * Remove the Guardian citation. Sensationalist media with bias attitudes and agendas are generally not a reliable source, especially when dealing with political issues. According to the UK Polling Report 73-82% support keeping the monarchy. See here. Given that it is an authoritative source which is both neutral and unbiased, it is a far more accurate representation of British opinion. Sometimes we just have to use commonsense on Wikipedia, for example, if the Guardian were to say the sky is orange, would we go ahead and edit Wikipedia accordingly? No we wouldn't. In my opinion one or two editors are just trying to push their own personal agenda and are willing to use any reference to support their anti-monarchy lobbyist POV.Antiochus the Great (talk) 17:45, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
 * There's a massive difference of course between a genuinely "scientific" opinion poll of an entire population – which are often commissioned from polling companies by newspapers – and a survey of a paper's readership. Sure the text as written does explicitly say that it is such a survey, and in that sense it does not literally mislead, but having these figures in the midst of other "proper" polls is odd and suggests that they represent some kind of shift in opinion: and that is misleading because it is not contrasting like with like. More generally, a readership survey of this sort tells us about the balance of opinion among Guardian and Observer readers, and hence would have more relevance as information on the pages about those papers, rather than offering any substantive relevant insight into the state of "Republicanism in the UK", any more than information about what Mail and Telegraph readers thought would. (I came via note on UK page btw).  N-HH   talk / edits  17:56, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Agree to removal. I hardly think that one poll in a newspaper with a left leaning readership is what one would qualify as a formal poll. I also agree with above that you can't really use newspapers to give poll results as they will either be inherently biased towards one answer by the way the question is worded or biased towards their readership. (just to note,I also came from the note on the UK page)  The C of E God Save the Queen!  ( talk ) 18:03, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
 * I see no reason to exclude the poll. The article is about "Republicanism in the United Kingdom", not about monarchism, and therefore it makes sense to say that Guardian readers are largely republican.  The Guardian btw is not left-wing, it is a liberal paper.  TFD (talk) 18:54, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
 * No the Grauniad is generally a left-leaning paper - see its own article for quotes from editorial staff and contributors on that point. It's undue weight to include a poll of one paper's readers, particularly a relatively unpopular paper - according to List of newspapers in the United Kingdom by circulation it comes 11th out of the twelve national dailies - and it would be overkill to add polls from all twelve. Stick to polls of the country at large. Timrollpickering (talk) 19:12, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
 * No, it is liberal, and has supported the Liberals whenever that party was in contention. In fact it is obligated by the Scott Trust Limited to remain "faithful to liberal tradition."  Mind you, I doubt that over at the Monday Club they would appreciate the distinction.  TFD (talk) 18:12, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Well, to be fair, and on this side point, as we know "liberal" has a broad meaning in politics. It's not just the Monday Club who might blur those boundaries, and the two categories are certainly not mutually exclusive. I'd suggest that for most of the 20th century the Liberal tradition was one of the centre-left in Britain. In the 19th century "Liberals" might have espoused policies re trade and economics that would seem "right-wing" to us in a modern context and in the 21st century, well, who knows post-Orange Book, but there's certainly no contradiction. And as for the Guardian and the Liberal Party specifically, the paper has flitted to and from support for the party at election time, as this depiction shows, and I'm not sure we can put any of that down to simply whether or not the party was in contention in any sense (which it hasn't been seriously of course since the 1920s).  N-HH   talk / edits  11:19, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
 * The point is that republicanism developed out of the liberal tradition, hence is not a "left-wing" viewpoint. One can be a republican without being left-wing.  The Republican Party of the U.S. for example is not left-wing, yet is republican.  While there has been little prospect for the Liberals to hold power since the 1920s, there have been times when they stood to hold the balance of power, become official opposition, or make sufficient gains that they could win next time.  TFD (talk) 14:06, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
 * We're slightly in the realm of semantics here, as well as floating a bit away from the main point, but I'd dispute much of that and continue to disagree that there are necessarily the sort of distinctions that you imply (and it was never suggested, for example, that you had to be left-wing to be a republican). Regardless of where exactly all these terms intersect, and regardless of what precisely motivated the Guardian on each occasion to switch between Labour and Liberal parties, what is not in doubt is that readers of that paper are probably more likely to be republicans than those, say, of the Telegraph or than members of the UK population as a whole. And what is at issue is why we would choose to highlight the views of any such sub-group in a section that is otherwise about UK opinion as a whole, any more than we would single out for mention what people whose surname begins with "B" happen to think among themselves.  N-HH   talk / edits  11:06, 23 April 2013 (UTC)


 * Rather than removing the Guardian and Observer readers' polls sentence (with ref), add another sentence after it saying something like "However, according to the UK Polling Report in 2012 showed 73-82% support keeping the monarchy." (I know the suggested sentence does need polishing) Then use the reference found by Antiochus the Great to back it up. That way there is a balance of both sides. HLE (talk) 22:41, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Just because information has a source, that doesn't mean it has to be included or to stay – it has to be relevant and make sense in the context. However, as noted, this is not comparing like with like. There's no "however" about it, nor is there any "balance" – that would only come if we said "67% of Guardian readers [who represent a self-selecting 5% of the overall population] think the monarchy should be replaced, however only 14% of Telegraph readers [who represent an equally self-selecting 9% of the population, usually with opposite views to Guardian readers] supported abolition" (or indeed, as suggested, included results of readership surveys of every paper, and even magazine in the UK). And what, exactly, would that be telling anyone? If it's going to stay, it needs to be in an entirely separate section about the UK media, with that broader coverage of what other publications and their readers think. Btw it's worth noting that that UK polling report includes mention of this poll published by the Guardian, which is not only more recent but would be fine to include as it is a population-wide poll, which just happens to be have been commissioned and published by the Guardian, which is a very different thing from what we have here.  N-HH   talk / edits  08:42, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
 * There are already references to at least four other opinion polls. That was never the problem. Adding one more is hardly a compromise and does nothing to address the concerns that various editors have now expressed with this poll. I think a section on media opinion might not be a bad idea. --Lo2u (T • C) 09:30, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
 * I wasn't suggesting we should necessarily include that other poll, I was just really mentioning it here as a way of highlighting what the actual problem is with the one we currently have – which is that it's a readers' survey, not an opinion poll, and only represents a sub-group of the UK population, and a self-selecting one at that (some comments seemed to be close to suggesting that publication in the Guardian was itself the issue).  N-HH   talk / edits  10:12, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Sorry, I wasn't very clear then. The first part was actually a response to HLE's compromise suggestion of adding yet another poll, the second was to you. --Lo2u (T • C) 11:11, 21 April 2013 (UTC)


 * Just to add my two-pence - a specific section on opinion polls (last 10 years or so) should be added with all respected polls included. Regarding the Guardian poll - it should be included BUT only if it is made clear in the article who was surveyed in the poll (ie not the UK general public but a particular group/section of people). If it really was just Guardian readers then I'm not surprised by the outcome. The newspaper is well-known as being made for the left, by the left, and has always been of a republican stance. David (talk) 12:20, 21 April 2013 (UTC)


 * I'm quite happy with David's suggestion for a readers/opinion polls section, and that it should be made clear is about the views of a particular group/section of people, and is not about the views of the wider UK general public. HLE (talk) 13:07, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
 * The text currently used already makes clear that it is a based on the papers' readership, as has been noted above. The issue is why we would include a survey of a limited sub-group – let alone this particular sub-group and this particular sub-group only – in the middle of a section where all the other stats are details of formal polls of the whole UK population.  N-HH   talk / edits  13:13, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

As explained in my edit summary, I've moved the reference to a new section. I hope this satisfies the demand of a minority for flawed, biased polling. --Lo2u (T • C) 11:56, 7 June 2013 (UTC)

Richard Littlejohn
I have (again!) removed Richard Littlejohn from this article. He is not a republican, firstly he is a right-wing commentator and all republicans are left-wing as shown by the list and there is no reliable source that supports claims he is a republican. The only source is a webchat where he makes an offhand comment saying "I would abolish the Monarchy", this does not prove he is republican. A republican is not simply someone who is anti-monarchy it is someone who wants a republic with an elected head of state. I feel Littlejohn is just anti-Monarchy not republican. Any thoughts would be appreciated. Christian1985 (talk) 18:03, 4 November 2013 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure being right-wing means it is impossible to be a republican, although it obviously makes it less likely, especially in a British context. That said we need evidence before placing people in this list: as you say, this is an off-hand comment and one that in any event does not explicitly assert republicanism. Overall, I'm not sure we'd be better off losing this whole list. Sourcing and definition is always going to be a problem, as is lack of clarity as to whether it purports to be comprehensive. And if it was comprehensive, it would be very, very long and take over the page.  N-HH   talk / edits  22:08, 4 November 2013 (UTC)

Lists pt2
Just to log my agreement with the removal of the recently added list of monarchy supporters. As noted above, there are problems enough with the list of supposed republicans (which I think should probably be removed itself). I can't see much value in adding a second list, which will suffer from all the same problems, as well as being at one remove from the actual topic here, in terms of supposedly reflecting opposition to republicanism. Arguably it creates balance, but what next – a third list, of "ambivalents" or "don't care either ways"? Plus you're never going to get these lists to reflect the actual balance of any debate because the names, and number of names, that appear in each of them will always be utterly random.  N-HH   talk / edits  10:39, 23 November 2013 (UTC)

Category talk
Please see my proposal at Category talk:British republicans concerning categorisation of British republicans. AusLondonder (talk) 00:44, 28 April 2015 (UTC)

Category merge proposal
Please see my proposal at WP:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2015_May_2 AusLondonder (talk) 15:11, 2 May 2015 (UTC)

External links modified
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Feverish discussion
We're having a feverish discussion between royal celebrity fans and Wikipedia editors at Education of the British Royal Family if anyone is interested. LavaBaron (talk) 20:41, 21 April 2016 (UTC)

Treason Felony Act
There's a lot wrong with this bit. 1. The law has fallen into obsolescence and yet more than half the lead is devoted to it. The lead should serve as a summary of the contents of the article and yet there's nothing on it lower down. 2. "this is generally considered to be outdated and is not enforced", whether true or not, is not an encyclopedic wording. 3. "Since both speaking against the Monarch and freedom of speech are constitutional law neither take precedent". This is untrue, as a general principle, and barely comprehensible. 4. "technically freedom of speech is not granted against the Monarchy" - a bizarre wording that is not found in the source and suggests the author has not understood what he has read. The principle of freedom of expression in the Human Rights Act doesn't amend primary legislation; it simply allows courts to declare that a law is incompatible. In this sense freedom of speech is not granted against anyone if it conflicts with the law. There's nothing special about the way these principles apply to the monarchy, certainly not according to the source. This is at best original research but arguably untrue. 5. "Under the Treason Felony Act of 1848, any attempt to 'deprive the Monarch of the Crown' is an act of high treason". No. That's a different crime. The crime here, if there is one, is treason felony. 6. "British judges ruled in 2003 that this does not prohibit peaceful advocacy of republican opinions". Completely untrue and not in the source. The Lords declined to express an opinion on the matter, ruling that the Guardian's appeal was pointless, and that the court's time "should not have been wasted" because no prosecution would ever be brought. 7. More generally I don't understand why so much space is devoted to this arcane law. It gives the impression that this is a subject of central importance to the article when it's basically a minor curiosity. --Lo2u (T • C) 22:51, 10 January 2015 (UTC)


 * Here is a link to the source. It should probably be corrected, with other sources added and moved to a new section with a brief mention in the lead.  The source does not seem to think it is illegal to advocate a republic, just the overthrow of the monarch.  It deserves at most a single sentence mention in the lead.  TFD (talk) 01:38, 11 January 2015 (UTC)


 * Thank you. Actually, my reading of the source is that the distinction is more between advocating peaceful and non-peaceful overthrow of the monarch, rather than between advocating the overthrow of the monarch and advocating the creation of a republic, which is probably too fine a distinction even for the law lords. Actually, there is a brief mention of the Act in the article, which I missed. It's better than the rambling piece of original research in the lead but probably also needs clarification. However, I would suggest the reference in that section is not a reliable, independent source. The newspaper's assertion that it merely "technically lost the case" also seems very optimistic. The judges did not rule that the law doesn't "prohibit peaceful advocacy"; they refused to rule on the matter, implying the grievance was manufactured and arguing that it should have been obvious to the litigants that no public prosecution would ever be made, that no private prosecution would ever be allowed and that even if it were allowed, it would probably not succeed. --Lo2u (T • C) 10:58, 11 January 2015 (UTC)


 * http://repwblic.informe.com/viewtopic.php?t=438 - Yr Ardystiad - Campaign Against The Treason Felony Act 1848 - ( THIS IS " Y REPWBLICAN " - THE " PURE REPUBLICAN " DAVID B LAWRENCE - THE POET " Dai Saw " AND POLITICO " dai repwblic " - and rather than use this page to promote my politics I am putting down this note to invite somebody else to research and write about " Yr Ardystiad " which in 2010 resulted in this - Yr Ardystiad - Campaign Against The Treason Felony Act 1848 - http://repwblic.informe.com/viewtopic.php?t=438 - in which you will find an account of the very public row which erupted n 2012 on the front page of The Western Mail - http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/plaid-cymru-leader-leanne-wood-2024296 - in which the words of The Black Faction within Cymru Rydd were placed beneath that photograph where I am holding the microphone for Leanne Wood AM later leader of Plaid Cymru who was later invited to explain " Yr Ardystiad " on BBC Parliament and made a mess of it - whereas I originated it and yet was not invited to explain it : there is clearly a policy at the BBC to not knowingly give The Republicans in Wales any representation in any broadcaast yet I have participated in a BBC TV political panel ( where they refused to allow me to identify my political identity ) and I have had several of my non-political contributions published on BBC Radio 4 : and this despite 20% of the adult population in England and Wales self-identifying themselves as " Republican.")DaiSaw (talk) 18:40, 21 October 2016 (UTC)

Name of the republic
What is the proposed name of the Republic? The Republic of Great Britain? Lugevas (talk) 13:52, 3 February 2016 (UTC)


 * I'm not aware of any sources that give a proposed name. I believe Republic (political organisation) talk about "a British Republic", but the use of the indefinite article seems to indicate a lack of fixedness on the question of a name. Polly Tunnel (talk) 18:34, 3 February 2016 (UTC)


 * There is now nearly five hundred years of Republican philosophies, movements and parties within what is presently called " The United Kingdom " - and I am very unhappy having just discovered this page that " Anti-Monarchism " is being equated with " Republicanism " which is a nonsense : Republicanism is named after Cicero's De Re Publica and it is about " The Rule of Law " and in contrast to " Sovereignty " i.e. in total opposition to the idea that laws can be passed that place anybody above, below or otherwise outside of " The Rule of Law " - which does not exclude the institution of " The Royal Family " provided that they are subject to " The Rule of Law." The present situation in " The United Kingdom " is that " Sovereignty " is being increasingly cited to justify - arresting, holding, prosecuting and jailing people all in secret ; - excusing from being subject to various laws The Agencies of The State e.g. The Secret Inteligence Services, Police, Courts, Parliaments, Ministries, Armed Forces etc ; - licencing further degrees of surveillance e.g. into private bank accounts, phone lines, email accounts etc and for the most trivial offences such as not placing the rubbish bins out on the right day or failing to attend appointments ; - in short : whilst " The United Kingdom " does indeed have a written constitution it is not one single document and even the government's own lawyers admit that even if they can find the relevant parts of the constitution they often prove to be contradictory and can not decide it ...

... Most of the constitutional lawyers would agree that " The United Kingdom " is in effect a dictatorship - but in most dictatorships the person who appears to be the lone autocrat has to rely upon a body of other powerful people supporting them ... In " The United Kingdom " the same is the case in theory - BUT : the other members of The Cabinet at No10 Downing Street are not powerful people whose opinions can not be disregarded so The Prime Minister simply dismisses those who do not support them ... the whole political system depends upon those in power being well-behaved - and it can be argued that even if there is a constitution all political systems rely upon the same principle ... the counter-argument is to ask how anybody's behaviour is to be judged if there is no agreed written account of what " well-behaved " means ... as to what to call this " future " republic - that question assumes that " The United Kingdom " is " not a republic " because it has " The Royal Family " : but this question is irrelevant to a Republican because Republicanism is not Anti-Monarchism - and I am telling you this as Wales' most prominent - notorious even - advocate of Republicanism : I am David B Lawrence - " dai repwblic " - meta-ideologist, raconteur, politico and poet - and I write on Wikipedia using my bardic name " Dai Saw " ... So please take my word for this - " The United Kingdom " was shaped and recreated time after time according to the then prevalent political theories and they were all known as " Republican " political theories and that is why " The United States of America " was founded as a " Republic " - not a Democracy - in its constitutional documents : the " rebels " were the 18c politicians in " The United Kingdom " who in hoping to raise new taxes in the colonies went against the agreed political consensus which was - Republican ! ... That is why the colonists had so many sympathisers and advocates like the - Republican ! - Edmund Burke ... In mid 18c London the rebel to invite to The Royal Family's dinner was the celebrated Corsican Pasquale Paoli - The Republican who created the first modern Revolution ! ...

... But everything changed with The French Revolution whose sympathisers were targeted by " The Two Acts " - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seditious_Meetings_Act_1795 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treason_Act_1795 - and of course Edmund Burke and others sympathised with the ideals professed but vigorously opposed what was being done in the name of " Republicanism " in favour of their own tradition : in other words the French word " Republique " which in English was rendered as " Republic " and in Welsh as " Repyblic " - modern spelling " Repwblic " - became associated first of all with fanaticism, then criminality and then as the war began those who continued to advocate it were deemed to be allied to the French and were damned as traitors ... Laws were passed against those who persisted publicly advocating for " The Republic " and so most withdrew away from the word and emphasised their patriotic credentials by returning to the English word for it - " The Commonwealth." ... Now if you can find the relevant constitutional documents you will find that word being used in them e.g. " The Commonwealth of The United Kingdom " - i.e. if you would kindly stop ignorantly equating " Republicanism " with " Anti-Monarchism " - and instead refer to our actual political theory - you will find that " The United Kingdom " is not merely technically a " Republic " but actually ( supposedly ) it legally is one. You would like some more accessible and tangible evidence ? Prior to The French Revolution there were very few bank notes in circulation in " The United Kingdom " but many of them had Latin mottoes on them such are still displayed on the bank notes of the Bank of Ireland ( a Loyalist bank in Belfast - i.e. not " anti-monarchist " - it was granted its banking charter with this motto by " The United Kingdom " before The French Revolution - so : perhaps some good evidence ?)

" Bona Fides Reipublicae Stabilitas " = https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonwealth = https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glorious_Revolution

I provided the link to " The Glorious Revolution " because the constitution is basically still that settled in 1688 - in terms of the early Republican political theory of " The Four Estates " I now identify " The United Kingdom " as neither a Democracy nor a Monocracy : " The United Kingdom " as created by The ( political ) Union of Scotland and England in 1707 was explicitly an Aristocracy and it still is - even though their complete control of Westminster was broken by The Parliament Act in 1911 the Aristocracy still basically control " The United Kingdom " because they still control The City of London e.g. in the recent banking crisis when The City of London over-reached itself in reckless investments which promised to bankrupt The Aristocracy - possibly still the wealthiest community in The World - the " non-political " system as I have described it - " The United Kingdom " was required to bail them out by taxing the poorest communities in Britain ... The result of the recent European Referendum reflects the fact that in effect one wealthy donor decided to change the fate not only of the 70,000,000 or so inhabitants of Britain but arguably 4,000,000,000 or so more across The World to secure his bank from failure : The European Union was just about to implement new banking rules to remove the protectionism enjoyed by banks in The City of London.

Personally - since I am a pragmatic person and so advocate " Inter-dependence within The European Union " - and since I am greatly interested in what happened in the 1790s and how a perfectly useful - indeed celebrated - political theory became so villified and buried in undeserved ignomy by vicious propagandists on behalf of " The Aristocracy in The United Kingdom " claiming to defend " The Monarchy " which de facto had ceased to exist over a century before hand - I like to advocate what others did in the 1790s - " The United Republic."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Society_of_the_United_Scotsmen

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Society_of_United_Irishmen

https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/S0020859000008221

- AND PLEASE : ANTI-MONARCHISM IS NOT REPUBLICANISM - PLEASE : READ SOME PROPER BOOKS - GET A CORRECT AND ORTHODOX VIEW OF REPUBLICANISM !

http://www.oxfordscholarship.com/view/10.1093/0198296428.001.0001/acprof-9780198296423

Republicanism: A Theory of Freedom and Government - Philip Pettit - Oxford University Press

Abstract

The long republican tradition is characterized by a conception of freedom as non‐domination, which offers an alternative, both to the negative view of freedom as non‐interference and to the positive view of freedom as self‐mastery. The first part of the book traces the rise and decline of the conception, displays its many attractions and makes a case for why it should still be regarded as a central political ideal. The second part of the book looks at the sorts of political and civil institutions that would be required in a society in which freedom as non‐domination is systematically fostered. It outlines the causes and policies, the constitutional and democratic forms, and the regulatory controls that a republican state ought to endorse. And it argues for a vision of the state's relation to civil society in which there is no pretence of doing without widespread civility and trust; the argument is that the state ought, at once, to foster and build on such extra‐political foundations.DaiSaw (talk) 20:56, 21 October 2016 (UTC)

Speaking as a Republican I find virtually nothing about Republicanism on this page : I have written this to explain it a bit.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republicanism_in_the_United_Kingdom

INITIALLY I TITLED THIS " I am going to look through this page to see if I can find anything about Republicanism in it! " [ = NONE REALLY ]

I will figure out a new title :

Nothing there except - " A republican government was briefly established in the mid-17th century, after the Parliamentarian victory in the English Civil War." - which is a highly doubtful statement : a form of Republican government was being planned under President Bradshaw in " The Republican Government " of 1649-53 but it was riven by arguments and as the final result was emerging - not Democractic but with Liberty of Conscience - Cromwell on behalf of those who could feared both then suppressed it and replaced John Bradshaw with Henry Lawrence. I think that the critical moment was the trial of William Erbery because he was the most popular radical writer of this first period of freedom of the press. William Erbery objected to all authority based upon theologies and to his contemporaries he was more threatening than Anarchists appear to be to us now : I believe that it was his arrest in 1652 which galvanised all those concerned for religious liberty to coalesce in his defence as " The Religious Society of Friends " - a term which is taken from his later writings - later abused as " The Quakers " - and I think that their appearance as an organised body of radicals with their national organisation with their headquarters in Swarthmore Hall is probably what precipitated Cromwell's " True Blue " faction to overthrow " The Republican Government." Why ? Because John Bradshaw and Thomas Fell were the commissioners in charge of the confiscated Duchy of Lancaster - which is why in 1652 ( when " The True Blues " i.e. those determined to preserve " The True Christian Faith " and impose it upon others to create " A Godly Nation " arrested William Erbery ) - a number of people concerned to preserve religious liberty went to Swarthmore Hall which was the home of Thomas Fell who informally was the vice-president of " The Republican Government." The reason why this meeting was taking place in Ulverston was in order to avoid Cromwell's spies - and we only know about it through the self-preoccupied account of his part in it by George Fox which was written down thirty years later in his " Journal " which is nothing of the sort : it was written to bolster his claim to have discovered " Quakerism " and to have founded " The Religious Society of Friends " - but despite the popular histories it was definitely founded in London and Quakers were first recorded there in 1647 : George Fox sent James Naylor to London to contact The Quakers immediately after William Erbery's death - and having taken over the leadership James Naylor was put on trial on exactly the same charges laid against William Erbery by exactly the same people ... but by that time " The Republican Government " had fallen to " The Protectorate " and they made sure that James Naylor was convicted.

Now you might be asking what this " religious " episode has to do with Republicanism - because unlike me you are not Republicans ... This episode is very important : the meeting in Swarthmore Hall was of people allied to Arthur Haselrig - one of the five members of The House of Commons that Charles I marched into whilst trying to arrest his political opponents thus violating the privileges of Parliament ... that was the incident which triggered The English Civil War : Haselrig was The Republican in The House of Commons insisting upon The Rule of Law ... Haselrig's opinion in 1652 was already that Cromwell was a potential traitor to " The Republican Government " and he sent his secretary Anthony Pearson to this meeting in Swarthmore Hall : George Fox's obscuring description says that it lasted several weeks with people coming and going - the crisis for John Bradshaw in London trying to protect religious liberty in the person of William Erbery from Oliver Cromwell is not mentioned because it is not about George Fox being the important man there - which he was not ! ... If you have ever been around politicos this egotistic scenario is very familiar ... ( I am going to have to stop - but here is the point that I am struggling towards ) ... The account given on this webpage is not written by Republicans and so you think that Republicanism in Britain began in The Wars of The Three Kingdoms circa 1650 and presumably you think that it ended circa 1850 because you do not know anything about Renaissance Republicanism ( 1450-1650 ) or Modernist/Post-Modernist Republicanism ( 1850 - 2050 ? ) - you are not even talking about Neo-Classical Republicanism ( 1650 - 1850 ) even though you may think that you are because you think that Republicanism is Anti-Monarchism. Basically you are not talking about Republicanism at all : it is a political tradition not an historical narrative !

You are not thinking like Republicans : here is something that should be discussed on this page - what was " Quakerism " in 1652 ? ... In my view " The Religious Society of Friends " was " The Party of The Republic " - it was literally formed to defend " The Republican Government " because without the religious liberty which it protected their own causes were doomed : everybody was drawn in - Gerard Winstanley the leader of The Diggers, John Lilburne the leader of The Levellers, John Milton all but joined after The Restoration etc - and nobody doubts that these people were not political but for those who do not understand what 1652 is about there is no link to the present issue which is whether these latter day Cromwells like Theresa May will manage to suppress the internet cribblers in the same way that Cromwell tried to suppress the pamphlet scribblers in 1652 - and having seized power he then tried again and he succeeded in 1654. In the brief four years of " The Republican Government " they struggled to create new institutions and in order to do so they were struggling against centuries of the existing language which created their ways of thinking because they lacked access to any other accounts of other societies save The Bible and the writings of classical antiquity : they had never encountered in their own lives anything but a society that seemed to be based upon an eternal and stable order where nothing changed - but everything had changed and continued to change at an alarming rate ... some were intoxicated by the prospect - but most were terrified by it ... Cromwell grabbed for the brake in 1653 ... then in 1659 Monck decided to put the changes into reverse - despite having fought for " The Republican Government " and " The Protectorate " ... as Monck marched south towards London with The New Model Army he was confronted on the road by The County Militias which were full of all of those battle-hardened religio-political radicals which he had helped to purge from The New Model Army ten years before ... Again this is an historical incident that is conveniently forgotten : The New Model Army was deliberately formed to not be led by the County Gentry - and that is why religio-political radicals had flooded into it - in order to escape from the claustrophobic remains of feudalism ... The New Model Army in 1649 was packed with many had learned to read and write pamphlets and therefore in rejecting any worldly religious authority they had become Quakers - and so were thrown out of it : when they went home they escaped their feudal bonds once more by volunteering for The County Militias - which on The Great North Road that night in 1659 were being led by - Anthony Pearson.

In the decade 1649 - 1659 the conventional conceptualisations of society and politics collapsed - and not only in Britain and Ireland but also in Europe, where in fact this was already under way : what followed was Hobbes, Harrington, Locke, Spinoza, and many now forgotten ... the most argued over issue was " religion " but what e.g. Rousseau, Voltaire, Jefferson, Momoro etc were concerned about were powerful hierarchies spreading faulty thinking - but they had no plan to get rid of religion : they thought - I think - that it a human activity which can either be done well or badly ... in other words they discussed removing corrupt moralities and superstitious beliefs and propagating ideologies : and that is what Republicanisms are about - especially in the Post-World War Two Post-Modernist Republicanisms ... hence the speedy transition from theologically based ideologies in 1649 to philosophically based ideologies by 1659 is fascinating.

I ought to apologise for indulging myself in writing that off the top of my head - but equally those who wrote this page should apologise !

I have been trying to find out more - on and off - about Anthony Pearson - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthony_Pearson_%28Quaker%29 - because on that night in 1659 when " The Blues " were confronted by " The Greens " on The Great North Road Anthony Pearson took a decision which shaped the modern political world : rather fighting a pitched battle with the rebel army which could plunge " The Three Kingdoms " into a third cycle of civil wars he instead chose to accept the assurances given by Monck and escorted him into London to allow him to plead his political arguments peaceably ... Monck - by hook or by crook - succeeded in proposing The Restoration ... as a result over five hundred Quakers died, some five thousand were imprisoned, perhaps fifty thousand were fined ... The Religious Society of Friends withstood some thirty years of straightforwardly violent abuse which only began to abate once tens of thousands had chosen exile in America where their descendents and the institutions which they created laid the basis for and were the cause of The American War of Independence ... Oh - you thought that Quakers were always absolute pacifists ? - No : the first stronghold of Quakerism was in The New Model Army - William Erbery was a regimental chaplin and James Naylor was a regimental quarter-master - and Anthony Pearson led The County Militias in 1659. It was because everybody knew that " Quakers are soldiers who disobey their officers when they think that their God wants them to ! " that in 1659 there was a widespread belief that Anthony Pearson would indeed start The Third Civil War ... but he did not : when Charles II was restored the Quakers decided to stick with Anthony Pearson's decision - " If you do not attack us then we will have no reason to fight you - but we will be ready to " ... " The Peace Testimony " began as an assertion not of an Absolute Pacifism but as a re-assertion of Mathew 5.9 - The Sermon on The Mount - " Blessed are The Peace Makers " - which involves an English rendition of the Latin " paci-ficator." This is the religious idea which is planted at the centre of Republicanism - although few know the origins now of the term " Pacificator " and so as a consequence Republicans are regularly portrayed as subscribing to the use of violence in pursuit of their political ends : in fact Republicanism only allows for self-defence and then only when all else is lost - 15c Religious Republicans were enthusiasts for martyrdom ! - and the issues about this are like the controversy over the meaning of " jihad " as " struggle " or " war " in the Islamic versions of Republicanism ... In " Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen from the Constitution of Year I (1793) " this issue is dealt with by firmly placing it last on the list of rights - the last resort once all the other rights have been destroyed by a despotic government -

http://www.columbia.edu/~iw6/docs/dec1793.html - " 35. When the government violates the rights of the people, insurrection is for the people and for each portion of the people the most sacred of rights and the most indispensable of duties. "

- and the person who draughted that ( in French ) - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Williams_%28philosopher%29

- which brings me back to the point that I want to make : Republicanisms are discussed in terms of their histories - about the development of their ideologies and meta-ideologies - not in terms of war - AND - I have personally encountered some of the leaders of both " Republic " and " MAM " and they know absolutely nothing about any of the Republicanisms - apparently they actually thought that in my recommending them books written by Machiavelli I was performing some kind of criminal act !!! DaiSaw (talk) 01:50, 22 October 2016 (UTC)

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Splitting proposed
I propose that the section Republicanism in the United Kingdom (including both "Living" and "Deceased") be split into a separate page containing a stand-alone list called List of advocates of republicanism in the United Kingdom. The content of this section continues to grow and has become overly large in the context of an article that is already fairly long. Polly Tunnel (talk) 15:18, 21 March 2019 (UTC)

Requested move 4 October 2021

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. 

The result of the move request was: I withdraw this requested move, I will suggest a different name. Somerby (talk) 16:54, 5 October 2021 (UTC)

(non-admin closure)

Republicanism in the United Kingdom → British Republic – Strange to read about the republic United Kingdom. Somerby (talk) 19:38, 4 October 2021 (UTC) The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
 * Oppose: Article is about Republicanism in the United Kingdom (efforts to bring about a British Republic), not about a hypothetical British Republic; the title is, in my view, clear, and I would actually consider the proposed title to be confusing. BilledMammal (talk) 02:17, 5 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose: For similar reasons as above. The article is about a movement, "republicanism." Changing it would be confusing. To your point about the current title: The current title does not include a contradiction as you suggest. As with a situation such as "Anarchism in the United States," there is an anti-state movemement ... within a state/government. It is a movement to abolish in both cases.--MattMauler (talk) 04:23, 5 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose as above.(Strange to read about a kingdom headed by a female, but it's not the United Queendom either.) Republicanism in the United Kingdom doesn't necessarily mean a desire to bring about a British Republic, though: there is Republicanism in Northern Ireland, which is largely concerned about a united Irish republic, and only tangentially concerned with how the rest of Great Britain is ruled. There are movements for Welsh independence and Scottish independence from England, yet many people would support remaining part of the Commonwealth of Nations with Elizabeth II as the titular head of state. 85.67.32.244 (talk) 06:20, 5 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose As stated above, this article is about Republicans in the UK not a proposed "British Republic". Such a republic is already covered at Commonwealth of England. REDMAN 2019  ( talk ) 15:19, 5 October 2021 (UTC)

Opinion polling
Many thanks indeed to the anonymous (?) IP user who has added the “opinion polling” section to this article. A very useful and interesting addition. TrottieTrue (talk) 13:34, 12 April 2021 (UTC)
 * I suspect it was added to show support for the 'Windsors'. Although the monarchy is not beholden to the people, even if 99.9% of the population wanted a republic there is no mechanism to have one.     Red Jay (talk) 18:05, 12 April 2021 (UTC)
 * I don't; if you believe that other polls would show majority support for a United Republic of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, you're free to add them. (And I am not the IP who added the section.) Support for the monarchy as an institution, and for individual members of the Royal Family, tends to wax and wane depending on their actions: the Queen's popularity and support for the monarchy both slumped after the death of Diana, for example. Even if an American works abroad, she is still liable to pay Federal income-tax to the republic: what, in principle, is the difference? 85.67.32.244 (talk) 19:42, 5 October 2021 (UTC)

Requested move 5 October 2021

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. 

The result of the move request was: not moved   -- Calidum  03:45, 15 October 2021 (UTC)

Republicanism in the United Kingdom → British republicanism – Republicans in Britain not only want to change the form of government from monarchy to republic, but also to change the name of the state from kingdom to republic, or rather the English equivalent of this term: Commonwealth. The only (as far as I know) republican bill, Commonwealth of Britain Bill, proposed such a new name for the country: Britain. It was said above that Republicanism in the United Kingdom doesn't necessarily mean a desire to bring about a Commonwealth of Britain, though: there is Republicanism in Northern Ireland, which is largely concerned about a united Irish republic, and only tangentially concerned with how the rest of Great Britain is ruled. There are movements for Welsh independence and Scottish independence. There are supporters for Welsh independence and Scottish independence, some of whom are also Republicans, and some support remaining part of the Commonwealth of Nations with Elizabeth II as the titular head of state. However, there are already articles about these movements: Irish republicanism, Scottish republicanism, Welsh republicanism! And this article is about British republicanism, and such a new title will better reflect the topic of the article. Somerby (talk) 17:18, 5 October 2021 (UTC)
 * "British" includes "Northern Irish", many of whom self-identify as "British" (some quite vehemently), so "British republicanism" would include Northern Irish republicanism: which is more or less an oxyoron. I bought Common Sense (Benn) when it first came out, so am quite familiar with the Commonwealth of Britain Bill, which it reproduces in full. Part of that Bill was that "British jurisdiction over Northern Ireland would be ended", as the article says. There is a whole section in the article ( that discusses, if briefly, republican movements in each of the four nations of the United Kingdom, which have somewhat different aims. There's not really any such thing as a British republican movement in the present day: the article is mostly history.
 * The article starts: Republicanism in the United Kingdom is the political movement... this to me is erroneous, there is no coherent single ("the") political movement. But then, I get annoyed when politicians patronisingly refer to "the black community", "the LGBT community", or whatever "community" as if all blacks, lesbians, etc were alike; often (it seems to me) to co-opt individuals who probably do not in fact share their views. "There is no such thing as society. There are individuals, and there are families." 85.67.32.244 (talk) 19:23, 5 October 2021 (UTC)
 * I agree with you. Republicanism in Northern Ireland is mostly Irish, but also exist Unionists who support a British republicanism. And some even support a Ulster nationalism. Therefore for clarity I think that we have to move this article to British republicanism. --Somerby (talk) 08:03, 6 October 2021 (UTC)


 * Oppose. Whatever republicans may want to call it, they currently live in the United Kingdom, so what is inaccurate about the title? -- Necrothesp (talk) 12:39, 6 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Necrothesp, as I said Republicanism in the United Kingdom include not only British republicanism, but also Irish republicanism and to a lesser extent Scottish republicanism etc. However, there are already articles about Irish republicanism and Scottish republicanism etc, and this article focuses on British republicanism. Therefore, British republicanism would be a more clear title for this particular article as it is now. --Somerby (talk) 13:14, 6 October 2021 (UTC)
 * The term "British republicanism" would also cover Scottish republicanism and Irish republicanism in Northern Ireland, as they're in Britain, so I fail to see your point. -- Necrothesp (talk) 13:17, 6 October 2021 (UTC)
 * Oppose. We have Republicanism in Australia, Republicanism in Canada etc, so the current title is WP:CONSISTENT.  This is an article about republicanism in a particular country, which for the time being is called the United Kingdom (notwithstanding that it does not currently have a king). Havelock Jones (talk) 09:44, 7 October 2021 (UTC)