Question on BRexit and the Queen

Great Debates
1

We keep hearing from the Brits on the board how the UK monarch has a lot of power that they’re not allowed to use. Here in the colonies it sounds like you guys are overblowing what the reality would be but then again, you think very differently than us.

But let me throw a unique situation out there for GD. the UK has barely passed the BRexit, Cameron will reign and I assume Elizabeth will appoint someone who will implement the referendum. There’s also a lot of people unhappy that want to stay in the EU and there are rumbling of splitting from the UK. So for the hypothetical, let’s say that as this goes through, there is a very real possibility of an independent Scotland, Northern Ireland uniting with RoI and Gibraltar becoming part of Spain. This would leave the UK as England, Wales, the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands (I think I covered every place). What would happen if QE2 uses her reserved powers* like withholding Royal Assent to block the BRexit to keep the UK united?
*Part of this hypothetical involves the gravitas that she has built up over the last 60+ years. She may be able to pull it off but I don’t think any future monarch could.

2

The Prime Minister would have to resign, as he would not command the confidence of his Sovereign.

3

Too much, in fact. The Isle of Man and the Channel Islands aren’t part of the UK.

4

Given her advanced age the most likely scenario in the short term would be for the British government to invoke the Regency Act and retire her to one of her country estates. It happened before with George III. In the long term the sovereign would either simply be stripped of reserved powers (like the King of Sweden) or the monarchy itself would be abolished.

5

Nah, only Thatcher thought she was royalty.

6

So, the vote won’t change whatever relationship the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands have with the EU?

7

The Isle of Man and the Channel islands are quirky special cases, not part of the UK, but crown dependencies. The isle of man was never in the EU, and they didn’t get to vote in this referendum. They are in the EU customs area, but people with “British Isles - Isle of Man” passports can’t work in the EU*

As far as I can tell, roughly the same for the Channel islands, not in the EU but in the EU customs area. It’s almost certain their status will change in some way but thats one of those issues that will have to be ironed out in the lengthy negotiations.

  • unless they can, its complicated and theres exception’s.
8

And the Brits and the loyal colonials on the board keep telling you that QEII is head of state, not head of government, as distinct from POTUS who is both.

Cameron has resigned

No, QEII will commission whomever commands a majority in Commons as prime minister to lead her government.

If/when parliament passes a bill to formally exit the EU and QEII refused to sign it then her successor, or the incoming UK President would.

That gravitas is earned because she does not intervene in domestic or foreign affairs despite having an eminently sound head on her shoulders, is well advised and is probably the most experienced head of state in the world and whose advice naught but a bloody fool would not take due deed of.

The confidence of the Sovereign is implicit, PMs are only compelled to resign if they have lost (or are pre-empting their loss of) confidence of parliament.

9

There are a couple of things here.

Firstly, there’s no way Gibraltar would want to join Spain.

Secondly, membership of the United Kingdom is entirely separate from membership of the EU. Scotland outside the Union but inside the EU would be a disaster.

Thirdly, the Monarch is the ultimate backstop against an overweening Prime Minister (Thatcher, Blair). For the Monarch to act would indeed cause a crisis, but the mere threat of the Monarch acting keeps them in line.

10

…for Scotland, or for England?

11

If the monarch should feel it necessary to act, I would assume that the situation is already beyond crisis and fast approaching Armageddon.

12

The last time a British monarch refused to give royal assent was in 1708, when Queen Anne vetoed the Scottish Militia Bill.

13

For Scotland: our resources would be plundered, our wishes ignored. But hey, Sturgeon would get her place in the history books.

14

If Queen Elizabeth were to throw herself on the pyre, as it were, and refuse Royal Assent, though, would that refusal hold?

She’s 90. I don’t think it would matter greatly if she were forcibly retired from active queenhood, and this would be a great way to use her accumulated capital of popularity. Even if it were the end of the monarchy.

So assuming she were to do so, would it take, or would they just collect the assent from Charles, as regent? Since most of the government are in the Remain camp, surely this would be the perfect solution? Let her take the political hit, since she can afford it, along with Cameron and (it looks like) Corbyn, and then business as usual.

15

It occurs to me that the Queen is incredibly respected; but, as you say, 90.

Imagine that, with no sign of refusing assent, she ends her reign tomorrow.

Imagine, too, that the first act of Charles is to refuse assent.

It’s unlikely that she could swing it – but him?

16

Then say hello to King William.

But the OP’s scenario is not going to come to pass. Gibraltar will not join Spain and Scotland will not get another referendum and the United Kingdom will not disintegrate.

17

Aren’t they still part of the Greater Third Reich, or has that changed? Sorry, but my knowledge of history sorta peters out after 1942.

18

The Channel Islands were occupied by Germany during WWII; the Isle of Man was not.

The exact relationship between both of them and the UK is horrible confusing, and I’m not certain that the Queen has any better a grip on it than the rest of us do.

19

And that was done on the advice of her Ministers, given in the light of late-breaking political developments. I don’t know when a British monarch last refused assent to a Bill favoured by both Parliament and ministers because the monarch personally thought it was a bad idea.

20

The situation with the crown dependencies is complex but not it doesn’t have to be confusing.

The Isle of Man and Channel Islands are feudal possessions of the crown. They are different from the United Kingdom which is a country of which the Queen is monarch, but the United Kingdom isn’t a “possession” of the Queen. She’s sovereign, but not a feudal lord (even though her titles are feudal in origin.)

The Lord of Man is an ancient feudal title, referring to the feudal ruler of the island. That holder of that title became a vassal of the English monarch in 1399, and remained so permanently after (previous Lords of Man had been vassals of both the Kings of Scotland and England, at various times.)

In the 1700s the 2nd Duke of Atholl, also the hereditary Lord of Man, sold the title Lord of Man to the Kingdom of Great Britain for £70,000.

To understand what next, you must understand what the United Kingdom actually is and some basics of government systems from 300-500 years ago. Before 1707, there was a legitimate “Kingdom of Scotland” and a “Kingdom of England.” Wales was part of the Kingdom of England, while Wales had been an independent realm long ago, the English Kings had long since formally eradicated it as a separate legal entity and made it part of the Kingdom of England. It’s only in more modern times you’ve seen devolution of significant rights and separate powers to Wales.

Everyone knows Queen Elizabeth I, but what many for some reason forget is her death was quite possibly more important than her life–because it unified the monarchies of Scotland and England. Elizabeth never married and had no heir, so someone not her direct lineal descendant of course had to inherit her. It ended up under the family tree the next closest line heir was James, reigning King of Scotland. When Elizabeth died he became James I of England (he was James VI of Scotland.) James essentially immediately went to England, and it being the far more impressive realm he appeared to all but forget the country in which he was born and never returned (later monarchs have more deliberately made sure to spend time in Scotland to appease the locals.)

During the life of James I and for some time after, England and Scotland were in what is called a “dual monarchy.” This wasn’t at all uncommon in medieval to late medieval to renaissance Europe. The royal families intermarried, a lot. So it wasn’t at all uncommon per se for a King of one country to inherit the crown of another. But usually the two countries retained distinct legal systems, governments, and even laws of succession. This is why not only were Kingdoms unified under one ruler by inheritance, but dual monarchies could and frequently did split back up, when the heir of one crown would end up being different from the crown of the other (which happened because most countries of Europe had similar, but sightly different, laws of succession.)

In 1707, the Acts of Union did away with the dual monarchy. That is why anytime someone refers to the "Queen of England’ a know-it-all is quick to interject “there’s no such thing!” And, they’re correct. The country of England does have a monarch, but only in the sense that England is part of the United Kingdom, which has a monarch. Queen Elizabeth isn’t the Queen of Scotland or England or Wales or Northern Ireland, she’s the Queen of the United Kingdom. Now, in 1707 Queen Anne became “Queen of Great Britain” the Kingdom of Great Britain, by act of parliament in 1800, merged with the Kingdom of Ireland and became the “United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland”, which is the same country we have today, although it has renamed itself the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland due to the independence of the Republic of Ireland.

Without such a legal act, separate possessions of the crown do not “merge” into the country proper. So, quite simply, because the Kingdom of Great Britain bought the “title” of Lord of Man, but never incorporated man into the United Kingdom, it simply never became part of it.

What does that mean legally? In theory at one point in time the Lord of Man could act as a tyrant. In practice, the Isle of Man’s feudal leader has been hands off for a long while–even before the 2nd Duke of Atholl sold the title to the crown, instead the Isle of Man has been lead by a type of legislative body for ages–they in fact make claim to having one of the oldest legislatures in the world. [They fight with San Marino, Iceland, and a few other places for this claim, and there is no clear answer as to which is really oldest.]

A single monarch having possessions with different laws, thus isn’t really that unique. But it becomes a problem as societies move closer to modern times, and the need for democracy and etc is more obvious. So while the government of the United Kingdom doesn’t technically have any legal authority over the Isle of Man (Queen Elizabeth II does), Parliament handles her majesty’s duties as Lord of Man (not Lady) for her, because she is a constitutional monarch. What this has meant as a matter of practicality is the British government extends a citizenship to Manx people, and it “guarantees their good governance and defense”, which basically just means unless things go real bad there they leave them the fuck alone. The Isle of Man consequently is essentially an independent country domestically. They could have had greater union with Britain, but they’ve never wanted it, and are in fact pretty happy not having it.

The Isle of Man is a relict in many ways, it’s the last “remnant” Viking kingdom in the British Isles, and its culture and laws were never really intertwined with that of Great Britain’s.

The Channel Islands have a different history, but it’s similar. They aren’t part of the United Kingdom for essentially the same reason–they are a feudal possession of Queen Elizabeth’s, and those possessions were never by Act of Parliament “incorporated into” the United Kingdom (just as the Isle of Man was not.) The Channel Islands came under the crown in a different way–all the way back to William the Conqueror. Who, as you may recall, was Duke of Normandy. The Channel Islands are the last remnants of the English possession of the Duchy of Normandy. Over hundreds of years English France grew and shrank, until finally it was only a small bit of land around Calais in Normandy–and then finally it wasn’t even that, but the French were never able to get the channel islands, and probably after a point never cared to due to the relative worthlessness in most ways.

Just like Isle of Man they have their own governments, and are essentially independent domestically with British citizenship and Britain being responsible for their “ultimate good governance” and defense.

What’s worth noting is that while neither the Channel Islands or the Isle of Man joined the EU (and did not wish to do so), they are subject to some European organizations–like the European Court of Human Rights. This became relevant in the Isle of Man, because the Manx practiced legal corporal punishment in their legal system (a form of caning) until the latter half of the 20th century), it was only stopped because of the ECHR.

On the Channel Islands, one of the islands (Sark), was subject to a genuinely feudal system, with the Lord of Sark (Seigneur) having essentially true feudal power over the island. He customarily devolved some of it to a council, but he still collected special feudal taxes personally on various things, and exercised genuine power. The people of Sark didn’t seem to mind this situation, but two billionaire brothers (the Barclays) bought an island that was part of the fief of Sark, and chafed at being subject to this minor noble’s rules and his property taxation rights. They worked to change the government on Sark for years, maintaining it wasn’t consistent with the European Convention on Human Rights and waged a lot of litigation. The people of Sark eventually agreed to a new constitution to appease them (they were the wealthiest people on the island and were making investments in the local economy), but there have been complaints that since the 2008 removal of the old feudal system of government it’s been replaced by an undemocratic system of government in which the Barclay brothers have undue influence.

As far as the EU goes–when Britain joined on they had a problem because of these special-status dependencies. These dependencies didn’t want to join the EU, and while in theory Parliament could “force it on them” acting for the Queen (who as a feudal lord legally could actually overrule anything the governments of these possessions legislated) the British deeply respected the historical arrangement. They obtained a special dispensation. Residents of these dependencies would be British citizens but not EU citizens, they would not have most of the immediate benefits of EU citizenship and they would be given special passports denoting this. They also wouldn’t, of course, be subject to EU rules and regulations or anything else. However, if they move to British territory and reside for 5 years, they then become full British/EU citizens, and can get passports indicating such.

So for the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man, leaving the EU will be a lot less meaningful–they were never part of it, and it only really affected them in that they could eventually become part of it. It’s theorized that the EU might “go after” these places, because right now they actually function as tax havens (especially the Isle of Man) because they have easy access to EU markets but are outside the EU itself, a position only tolerated because of the special dispensation given to Britain. If Britain is outside the EU, it’s likely the EU may put in place restrictions designed to prevent some of the international finance shenanigans that go on.