The Queen has more power over British law than we thought • Hacker News Board

Re: The Queen has more power over British law than we thought

#491

Post by colejohnson66 » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 1:31 PM UTC

Reason077 wrote: post #393

joubert wrote: post #328

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Crown Estate is not the private property of the monarch. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crown_Estate Also see, from https://www.royal.uk/royal-finances-0 > The Crown Estate as a whole dates back from the time of the Norman Conquest. In 1760, George III reached an agreement with the Government over the Estate. The Crown Lands would be managed on behalf of the Government and the surplus revenue would go to the Treas…

> ”The Crown Estate is not the personal property of the Monarch. It cannot be sold by the Monarch” Correct. > “nor do any profits from it go to the Sovereign.” Incorrect. Currently 25% of the Crown Estate’s profits are paid to the Monarch. This was raised from 15% in 2018, and is set to revert back to 15% in 2028.

Why was it raised, but only temporarily?

Re: The Queen has more power over British law than we thought

#492

Post by tomcam » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 1:33 PM UTC

tomcam wrote: post #150

pmoriarty wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"the Queen has been a dutiful monarch (whos work ethic I happen to respect)" What work does the Queen actually do?

She is the head of state, a job for which the president of the USA has to pull double duty while also being the executive. It is an incredibly tedious job, requiring her to go to endless factory openings funerals, and so on. She doesn’t really have to do those things, but she has done them dutifully for 75 years or so. As far as I’m concerned it’s amazing and probably does a measurable amount to contribute to the sta…

EDIT: "secret service retinue", not "...revenue"

Re: The Queen has more power over British law than we thought

#493

Post by Consultant32452 » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 1:34 PM UTC

michaelmrose wrote: post #355

Consultant32452 wrote: post #313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's axiomatic of monarchy, not a thought process or reasoned argument. If the monarch owns all the wealth in the country, then if the wealth of the country goes down, the wealth of the monarch goes down. If the laborers die, if the resources are mismanaged, etc. then the monarch's wealth and power diminishes (because the laborer's lives and the resources are the monarch's wealth). A monarch may choose to spend their…

Firstly you are pretending that people are rational actors. This isn't necessarily true of people in aggregate and its sure as hell not true of individuals who have many wildly divergent understandings of the world, the probable end results of different actions, and desired outcomes including but not limited to aggregate wealth. Next this doesn't even work out if we replace the monarch with an automaton which faithfu…

I only spoke to the inherent incentives and risks for each type of leader: monarch and President. The rest of that stuff you filled in on your own.

Re: The Queen has more power over British law than we thought

#494

Post by etrevino » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 1:35 PM UTC

twoslide wrote: post #24

etrevino wrote: post #13

I used to work as a scholar of Britain (specifically executions in Early Modern England, but you pick up a lot along the way) and I've tried to explain to a lot of people the amount of influence and control that the monarch actually holds. I'm not sure that this is such a bad thing. The Queen can't create legislation, she can restrain it. She is purely a moderating influence in this sense. She could, in theory, name…

Interesting, does that mean that the Queen has implicitly agreed to a lot of controversial legislation (e.g. Internal Market Bill, and Brexit more generally), or the process of the proroguing parliament last year? It seems she might be a lot more conservative (lowercase) than many might like to think.

So, I have a new link! And yes, she has agreed to a lot of controversial legislation, including Brexit!

This article has the thousand-plus laws she's been consulted on: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/feb/08/royals-vette...

Re: The Queen has more power over British law than we thought

#495

Post by colejohnson66 » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 1:36 PM UTC

patmcc wrote: post #323

stqism wrote: post #315

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of this land and property is privately owned by the royal family but leased to the government, I’m not exactly versed in UK law; but a governmental attempt to seize a private citizens land seems like it wouldn’t be the smoothest thing to attempt to pull off.

I think you'll be surprised what a government can accomplish when it really tries. Being able to make laws helps with that.

Laws still have to respect the rights of the people, no? I’m not well versed in UK law, but the US, the legislature can’t just make a law making criticism of the government illegal because it’s a violation of our First Amendment right to free speech.

Re: The Queen has more power over British law than we thought

#496

Post by throwaway_kufu » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 1:37 PM UTC

skissane wrote: post #305

throwaway_kufu wrote: post #303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a common phrase bandied about: “Democracy is the worst form of government, besides all the others.” It’s oddly used as a pro-Merica. To which I normally say the US isn’t a democracy, but a Constitutional Republic. I don’t know why I do that, it only causes people to dig in deeper to their position. Their argument generally boils down to the US has elections and elections = democracy. I can even see hints of…

> To which I normally say the US isn’t a democracy, but a Constitutional Republic It is a silly semantic debate. If you define "democracy" narrowly to mean only direct democracy, then no the US isn't a democracy. If you define "democracy" broadly, to include representative democracies with constitutionally entrenched protection of minority rights, then yes the US is a democracy, as are quite a few others. Whether a c…

> If you define "democracy" broadly, to include representative democracies

I don’t think this is a matter of being overly pedantic. What you have done is redefined “democracy” to “republic”.

To use a real world example you don’t find many historians that call the ancient republic of Rome a democracy, or a representative democracy.

A republic is just that, a form of government where the people are represented by elected officials/representatives.

Does the US have any characteristic besides elections that results in you calling it a democracy? Do you call China a representative democracy? They do elect representatives after all.

Yes, clearly I give democracy the narrow definition where the people directly manage the affairs of the State, not elected representatives. It’s not just out of tradition though it’s because other forms of government have other names and democracies from the beginning have nothing to do with elections or electing officials. For example in Ancient Greece, the original “democracy”, they had officials for certain purposes that were not elected, they were selected from the populace through a lottery.

Re: The Queen has more power over British law than we thought

#497

Post by etrevino » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 1:39 PM UTC

benlumen wrote: post #433

etrevino wrote: post #13

I used to work as a scholar of Britain (specifically executions in Early Modern England, but you pick up a lot along the way) and I've tried to explain to a lot of people the amount of influence and control that the monarch actually holds. I'm not sure that this is such a bad thing. The Queen can't create legislation, she can restrain it. She is purely a moderating influence in this sense. She could, in theory, name…

What did you make of the debacle of the Fixed Term Parliament Act and the government being left unable to call a General Election in 2019 because of it? Supposedly it removed the power of the Queen to dissolve parliament. Lots of British people, me included, were deeply alarmed by it. Parliament was essentially rogue.

I agree with you that it was a debacle. It was meant to hold together the Lib Dem-Conservative coalition and once that went to pot it should have been scrapped. I don't think that it removed the Queen's (technical) ability to dissolve Parliament, instead it removed the government's ability to ask her to dissolve Parliament. It locked Parliament into a situation where no one had the power to do anything more than keep the lights on. It was gross.

* Had the Queen tried to dissolve Parliament I think they would have ignored her.

Re: The Queen has more power over British law than we thought

#498

Post by boomboomsubban » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 1:41 PM UTC

arethuza wrote: post #483

boomboomsubban wrote: post #469

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If a crisis happens, which side do you think the military would support, the one they pledged allegiance to or the one paying their wages?

I've actually had that discussion with an ex-Army officer and he was adamant that the Army would support the monarch. Mind you - he was an officer and from a rather posh guards regiment so that's kind of what I would expect him to say. Mind you - the UK can only have a standing army with the express permission of Parliament: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_of_Rights_1689

>Mind you - the UK can only have a standing army with the express permission of Parliament:

This requirement only seems to apply to British Army, the Navy and Air Force are exempt. W good example of how unimportant the pageantry is.

Re: The Queen has more power over British law than we thought

#499

Post by ColFrancis » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 1:43 PM UTC

pmoriarty wrote: post #135

retrac wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, this is very true. The Crown plays a useful and vital role in the Westminster system. (I'm in Canada.) It can't just be tossed without something to replace it. But I'm not sure the monarchy offers anything not provided by a nonpartisan and mostly ceremonial presidency, similar to Ireland or Germany.

"The Crown plays a useful and vital role in the Westminster system." What role does it play that an elected official isn't better suited for?

I'll bite.

One way to look at it is that with a portfolio of investments you want to spread your risk amongst different classes. If you are securing an IT system then you have defence in depth. If you produce medical devices you want to have physical and logical locking mechanisms (see Therac-25). The US style is to make everything elected: judges, sheriffs, presidents, governors, DAs and school boards are all elected. Which means that they are all vulnerable to the same class of failure.

Note: This particular role mentioned in the article, of providing consent/impact to certain broad classes of legislation, are not included in my argument above. I'm merely replying to your statement that an elected official is always better suited to all roles.

Re: The Queen has more power over British law than we thought

#500

Post by throwaway_kufu » Wed, Feb 10, 2021, 1:46 PM UTC

dane-pgp wrote: post #320

dodobirdlord wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> To which I normally say the US isn’t a democracy, but a Constitutional Republic. I don’t know why I do that, it only causes people to dig in deeper to their position. Perhaps because this is both pedantic and wrong? A state can be both a democracy and a republic, and many are, such as the United States.

> A state can be both a democracy and a republic, and many are, such as the United States. Always has been: "But a representative democracy, where the right of election is well secured and regulated & the exercise of the legislative, executive and judiciary authorities, is vested in select persons, chosen really and not nominally by the people, will in my opinion be most likely to be happy, regular and durable." -- A…

An Alexander Hamilton quote is reaching pretty deep. Ever stop and wonder why you would quote that and not the Constitution directly?

It’s because democracy doesn’t appear anywhere in the constitution. The law of the land, the very document that establishes our form of government doesn’t mention democracy, do you think it’s an accident or oversight of the founding fathers?

Article 4. Section 4:

The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government...