From Historia Civilis’ video, Reform or Revolution? (1830 to 1832)
https://youtu.be/h6E4_Bcmscg?t=250
The greatest thing that George IV ever did was die at the exact right time. That’s a mean thing to say, but the people at the time were way meaner.
In their obituary, The Times described their dead King, “the character of which rose little higher than animal indulgence.”
The people hated him. He was a glutton and an ostentatious spender during bad economic times.
A couple of days later, the paper couldn’t resist going back to get one last kick in, “there never was an individual less regretted by his fellow creatures than this deceased King.”
(Stop, he’s already dead!)
George had 10 children, but none with his actual wife, (you had one job, idiot) and so the Crown passed to his 64 year old brother William.
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The reason being, that when the king dies, it’s been tradition to dissolve parliament and call for a new election. The conservatives at the time did not like this because they lost 100 seats (after, um, killing 500 people at a peaceful protest in Manchester)
I don’t think that happened in September 2022 unfortunately. It would have been a great time to.
IIRC william was an unusually politically savvy king.
he did his coronation on the cheap so as to ease public sentiment. and then when told “sire, the peasants are revolting”, he did not say “yes, of course”, but (eventually) put pressure on the conservatives to get the reform bill passed.
Heh. And yeah the conservatives at the time sounded almost as bad as the ones we have today – wielding the power of counties with almost no constituents (e.g. the empty ancient city of Sarum had 2 MPs, the undersea city of Dunwich had huge voting power, and the Isle of Wight transparently bribed the few sparse voters it had because of how large it was)
and also, their only idea to solve the crisis was to commit a thousand more peterloos, which doesnt seem like a great idea in the long run…
if at first you don’t succeed…!
George V was also pretty based. Essentially, the House of Lords kept rejecting the Common’s bills to limit the Lords so he threatened to fill the Lords with people who won’t reject it.
We’ve been pretty good with monarchs in recent history anyway, barring Edward VIII
Sure, you can complain about the system, but now we have a funny old man who likes nature and pedestrian based affordable towns who’s worst flaw is that he cheated on his wife compared to his clownterpart across the pond who’s done it several times.
I dont like the monarchy, in the same way that I dont like the BBC.
But to remove them and replace them with something far far worse? No thank you.
I’m weirdly glad that some of my taxes goes towards experimental green towns, or part of my license fee goes towards high quality educational kids shows.
Tbh I think we have a lot to be thankful for in the BBC. I don’t think it’s possible to have a perfect system or broadcaster. The monarchy has worked for the UK for centuries. We haven’t slipped into fascism - the type of coup people describe Trump as doing would most likely be impossible in our lifetimes in the UK under the monarchy (depending how George Wales turns out, but he has good parents)
I’d argue that it wouldn’t happen under the monarchy, because the monarchy has always had a tenuous hold over public opinion and their livelihood could tip either way depending on how the public was feeling.
But under a system where the powers that be are beholden only to shareholders in major companies? No, those countries have more in common with Sparta than a democracy
It’s kind of like a necessary evil. Personally, a system of inheritance doesn’t sit right with me. But the fact of the matter is, it works and is stable. And larping as a kingdom is also pretty fun.
Why do we need anything “far worse”? Why not just remove them constitutionally and let them do their own thing? Smaller state and all that.
