One thing about living through such an epochal moment is that it presents an opportunity to take stock of the status quo.
Consequently, anyone in this archipelago which isn’t currently thinking about the concept of monarchy is probably beyond help.
More than a century ago on this island, my grandparent’s generation started to look at the world they’d been born into.
The impact of An Gorta Mór and the Land War was viscerally apparent in the Ireland of their childhood.
Brtish power was at its zenith, and everything looked set in stone.
It would have been madness to take on such an omnipotent imperium.
As a citizen of the Republic of Ireland, I’m glad they did.
The end of the Edwardian era in 1910 was a coming-of-age moment for many in the generation of Irishmen and women who would rise up against their colonial masters.
This iconic picture was taken only four after George V had become the British King.
James Connolly, the Irishman from Edinburgh, can be seen clearly in the middle of the group behind the second row of Irish Citizen Army volunteers.
Today there is no Kaiser in German, but there is a King in Britain.
As John Redmond extolled the Irish Volunteers to join the British Army to fight for little Belgium
The continent of Europe was the stage for the first truly industrial war.
Monarchy and empire were vital components of the conflict.
The British King, the German Kaiser were first cousins and grandsons of Queen Victoria.
At the end of the Great War, only one of those royal dynasties would still be extant.
Some folk on my social media yesterday appeared to be quite surprised that Charles III had to take a distinctly Scottish oath of office when he because the British head of state.
It was a powerful marker that Britain was the marriage of two states.
The current SNP policy is to re-instate the Regal Union of 1603; therefore, their evident devotion to Jimmy Saville’s bestie should not shock anyone.
It is worth noting that the SNP have no publicly stated issue with this 1603 sectarian rapprochement.
The qualifications to be the British Monarch is to be born into the Saxe-Coburg Gotha family and be the first in the line of succession when the incumbent dies.
That’s petty much the entire job description.
The current SNP position on the British constitutional arrangments is that they wish the 1707 Act of Union to be reversed, but not the Regal Union.
Dear reader, this is not the stance of a colony.
1707 was a marriage of two imperialist states.
Scotland, throughout the 17th century, had been in the colonisation game. They just weren’t very good at it.
Their five attempts at establishing colonies in the Americas didn’t come to much.
Ironically both Monarchs who approved of these adventures were called Charles.
Professor Tom Devine stated that when the British Empire was on full throttle in the 19th century, “there was no Scottish question”.
It is, perhaps, significant that the SNP’s first serious electoral breakthrough (Hamilton by-election in 1967) happened a decade after the Suez Crisis.
President Eisenhower had made it clear to Britain in 1956 that they were now subordinate to the USA on the global stage.
Suez was also during the period when the British Empire was visibly collapsing as a power structure.
This was important for Scotland as an internal part of the British state.
In his brilliantly excoriating “Inglorious Empire. What the British did to India”, Shashi Tharoor gives the Scots a special mention at the end of the first chapter.
In many ways, it is the most powerful one in the book. It is entitled “the looting of India”.
The Indian subcontinent was colonised by the Brits, as was Ireland and scores of other countries.
In 2022 there doesn’t seem to be much point in the imperialist marriage that created Britain.
Do England and Scotland decide to stay together for the sake of the Welsh?
Now the people of Cymru WERE colonised.
The English destroyed the ‘Laws of Hywel Dda’ when they conquered Wales.
Colonies do not get to keep their legal system.
We know that full well in Ireland.
Watch the brilliant Michael Sheen explain the Welsh worldview to Owen Jones of the Guardian.
After the 40-minute mark, he explains why the tradition of the Prince of Wales is such a humiliating affront to many in Wales.
Wales was colonised.
I understand why some in Scotland see themselves in a similar situation to the Welsh and, indeed, to ex-colonies of the British Empire.
Some in the pro-independence movement might imagine themselves as some kilted Patrice Lumumba.
However, they are only playing at a kind of anti-colonialism dress-up.
That was pointed out to Craig Murray yesterday on Twitter by an Irish Republican.
“Airbrushing is denial”.
Ouch!
If the Scots want to leave Britain’s imperialist marriage, then that is their right.
Indeed, all they have to do is vote for it.
For the avoidance of doubt, I think that, in time, Scotland could become a prosperous small European country.
If the Scots still wish to pledge their loyalty to the Saxe-Coburg Gotha dynasty, that is also their decision.
For us here in Ireland, what the neighbours do is primarily up to them.
We DO have a legitimate vested interest in the future of the Six Counties.
That is part of OUR colonial experience at the hands of the British, and we don’t have to pretend.
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I can’t recall Scotland, in more modern times, sending Blueshirts to Franco’s aid but perhaps that aspect of Irish history doesn’t suit the anti Scottish / SNP narrative that is becoming increasingly apparent in your posts Phil.
Every country has its dark history – we can’t change the past but we can all strive for a better (independent!) future for our children and grandchildren no matter what side of the Irish sea our Irish ancestry led us to.
O’Duffy’s Blueshirts were in the 1930s.
The same era as Mosley and the Billy Boys.
Your straw man argument is rather weak.
Try harder.
As Scotland becoming “independent” it is as risible as Farage’s fight for “freedom”.
The people of Scotland are already sovereign.
Only colonies have to recover their sovereignty.
I believe we might see Sevco turn up for their Euro match but not play out of respect for the corpse being howked around the mainland. Under the rules, Napoli will be granted a 3-0 win. That would be Sevco’s
best result since the last monarch and the last Prime Minister.
Thanks for providing a gateway to the phenomenal Michael Sheen interview.
I haven’t heard mention of my queen memory, that time when she was on telly talking about her horrible anus.
Crass
“The Scottish Oath of Office”. Wow. You learn something new everyday. Blatant.
In the ’60s, retiring players used to have to get a job or open a pub. My uncle was in the sheet metal business and came across a former Ranger’s left back who was a salesman and he told him that Eddie Turnbull, the then successful Hibs manager, had turned down the Ibrox job due to the low salary. On being told he would be a respected leader of the Protestant community, Turnbull replied with a few choice words as was his norm.
As an aside, I thought the head of the Church of England and I guess others, couldn’t be a divorcee.
All the photo leading this article lacks is Prince Andrew. Not suggesting in any way that Charlie has questions to answer or skeletons in the closet. However, his brother, who is front and centre of the mourning does have questions to answer and Jimmy Saville was a disgrace to the British Establishment. The more that comes out about that heinous person the more people and organisations knew or suspected what he was up to.
And before anyone weaponises Celtic in the subject I welcome investigations into anyone, everyone involved in such behaviour which seems to have been widespread in years gone by.
JS
There were plenty of Irish colonising on behalf of the British Crown too of course, not to the same degree as Scotland i agree but they existed. The 1916 rebellion was universally rejected by the Irish at the time amd look how that turned out. My point is, surely it’s not about nationhood but of class – the establishment class of every nation on the British Isles were up to their neck in oppressing the ‘lower’ classes of each nation and building the blood soaked empire.
There was no ‘Irish colonising’. Individual Irishmen may have contributed to the ’empire’ through service in the British armed forces with many being forced to make the choice between penury and starvation or taking the King / Queens shilling. Irish Catholics seldom held any position of authority in the Empire unlike the Scots who disproportionately made up a sizable percentage of those governing and administering the Empire. Ireland was a colonised country, the Irish as a nation did not decided to team up with another country to murder and pillage their way across the globe, the Scots as a nation did.
Yes, I should have written ‘Irish who were involved in colonising’. My point I guess (i accept coudl still be made in a better way but i’m not an academic) was along the lines of the ruling class sort of colonising its own people/country? Like you say, some had to choose penury or the bloody shilling and that happened all over the British Isles of course.
Oh dear.
You’ve rather missed the central point.
The key distinction is the role of the Scottish state in the imperial “game” in the 17th century and the role of the Scots post-1707 in building the British Empire.
There simply is NO Irish equivalent to this WITHIN THE BRITISH STATE.
Get it?
Apropos the Atlantic slave trade, many Irishmen took a full and shameful part sailing out of Bordeaux under a French flag and not out of Bristol under the Red Ensign.
I’ll leave it to others here if they so wish to further your understanding on the subject.
I do not have the time or patience to be the tutor of a heroically anonymous troll.
The Royal Grovel-Fest has been stomach churning. Protestors have been arrested, flights cancelled, comedians threatened, and the ‘great unwashed’ unable to watch football games. Sky TV predictably made a spectacle of themselves. One of their hysterical reporters hovered over Whitehall in a helicopter. She told a gullible nation that a huge movement of ‘monarch mourners’ were marching towards Trafalgar Square. It was in fact a demonstration, relating to a young unarmed man shot dead by the Met Police. Suffice to add, there’s been nothing in the mainstream media about this. All pretty Orwellian stuff.