Would anything change if Prince Charles *wasn't* his father?

[Diceman]

Ahhh! Double-post! Sorry about that :smack:

[matt_mcl]

@Freddy the Pig

Male parentage, of course, has always been trickier. Men don’t like to admit that they’ve been cuckolded, and some have accepted dubious children as their heirs. The youngest son of Charles IV of Spain, for example, was probably sired by his first minister (Godoy) who was a long-time lover of the queen, but Charles accepted the boy as his son.

Charles IV nothing – as recently as 1857, Isabel II of Spain’s kid, who later became Alfonso XII, was probably not the son of Isabel’s husband, the King Consort Francisco de Asís, who was as queer as a three-peseta bill. It’s now thought he may have been the son of Isabel’s captain of the guard, a Catalan named Enrique Puig i Moltó.

Of course, it’s a little late to do anything about it, unless you care to refight the Carlist Wars; in any case, the current Constitution declared King Juan Carlos I (Alfonso XII’s great-grandson) to legally be “the legitimate heir of the ancient dynasty.”

[Acsenray]

@Alive At Both Ends

No. If Charles acknowledges Harry as his son that’s all that matters. Remember DNA testing is a modern invention. For most of history there was no reliable way to prove paternity.

The law of succession cannot rely on paternity tests that simply did not exist at the time that law came into being.

The historical issue, as I see it, is that the law required actual paternity. If the putative father wanted to contest it, whatever he might offer in the form of evidence (his own repudiation for example) would be considered. DNA tests are merely another form of evidence – considering them in determining paternity doesn’t reach back centuries to give the ancestors powers they didn’t have and doesn’t mean that the law of succession “relies” on paternity tests.

It’s the same in criminal court – a jury today considering a charge of murder is doing exactly the same thing as a jury back then would be. The fact that DNA evidence is available now and wasn’t then does not mean that today’s jury is doing something materially different from what yesterday’s jury was doing.

[Bookkeeper]

@matt_mcl

Charles IV nothing – as recently as 1857, Isabel II of Spain’s kid, who later became Alfonso XII, was probably not the son of Isabel’s husband, the King Consort Francisco de Asís, who was as queer as a three-peseta bill. It’s now thought he may have been the son of Isabel’s captain of the guard, a Catalan named Enrique Puig i Moltó.

Of course, it’s a little late to do anything about it, unless you care to refight the Carlist Wars; in any case, the current Constitution declared King Juan Carlos I (Alfonso XII’s great-grandson) to legally be “the legitimate heir of the ancient dynasty.”

But in this case, wouldn’t Alfonso XII’s claim to the throne have come through his mother, regardless of who his father was? Or would his bastardy have made him ineligible (although that would be a different issue)?

[Colophon]

@Elendil's Heir

For what it’s worth, the most likely alternative dad says it ain’t him: BBC NEWS | UK | Hewitt denies Prince Harry link

How on earth could these rumours have started? :dubious:

[Acsenray]

@zev_steinhardt

An interesting thing to note is that the Act of Settlement of 1701, which governs who has the right to the crown, uses the phrase “heirs of the body”

In the common law of trusts and estates, “heirs of the body” does mean legitimate, actual genetic (“natural”) descendants. No adoptees allowed. No bastards allowed. Furthermore, it implicates the rules of primogeniture, meaning that only one person at a time will inherit, just as with the throne. It would seem to me likely that this is the meaning implicated by the Act of Settlement.