THE draining away of regal pa geantry in Canada by conceited politicians and bureaucrats threatens the right of millions of young citizens to the good life.
Unless young Canadians begin to demonstrate as ardently against the creeping republicans of Ottawa a3 they do against the martial policies of foreign countries they will lose the romance, splendor and nobility that enriched the lives of their parents.
Between the ages at which small school children wave flags at passing members of the Royal Family and graduate students find time to ponder the merits of a monarchy young minds nowadays are distracted by many coarse diversions.
To warn the teenagers of the dull gray days that lie ahead of them if they don’t start taking precautions I am trying today to raise my voice above the yelling of their rock ’n roll groups and to draw their attention to the crafty manner in which they are being fleeced of their heritage while their backs are turned I hold up to these well-fed, well-clad, well-housed, well-educated boys and girls two pictures, one of that freakish Beatle who arrive in Canada the other day, and one of Charles, Prince of Wales.
I ask any young people who are still with me to recall the turgid, inane, slum accented charade by the Beatle at his press conference, and the witty, charting, high spirited rejoinders given by Prince Charles to David Frost In a celebrated television interview.
Then I ask: Which appears to be the better man? Which would a girl prefer to marry? Which would a boy prefer as a friend?
All who choose the Beatle I abandon as hopelessly lost in the swamps of vulgarity. All who choose Prince Charles I urge to action.
This debonair young prince who loves Jazz, dancing, cocktails, sports cars, spirited horses and intimate suppers with lovely gals, surely is a standard bearer for all young people who also approve a sense of responsibility, tradition and duty.
If some youthful outcry against the power-seeking pen-pushers and tub- thumpers of Ottawa can be aroused, young Canadians of today will live through the prime of life under Charles III of Canada.
This king will not rule. He will reign. He will not introduce new laws himself nor will he attempt to thwart the law’s introduced by others. He will be the living symbol of the Canadian constitution, a democratic framework perfected after more than a thousand years of trial and error.
Under this constitution the king or queen of Canada is the repository and embodiment of all those social, polity cal and economic philosophies which have left us free of dominion by Great Britain, the United States or any other nation.
The fact that Charles III will also be the king of Great Britain, Australia, New Zealand and many smaller countries which once were colonies, if merely an accident of history.
In seating himself upbn the throne of Canada the monarch is elevated above politics. He is there to protect us from venal politicians, or men who place their personal interests above the Interests of the state.
In such leading republican states as the US.. France, the USSR and China the president climbs to his position of omnipotence either supposedly or in fact upon the votes of the people, and thus is subject to chance through vacillations of sentiment.
The cost of the Monarchy to the Canadian people, as represented in the residences and honorariums of the Governor General and the lieutenant governors of the provinces, is three cents per person per year.
If one studies the monarchies of today one will find that in general the people are more serene than the people in republican countries.
This is simply because the Crown sets a limit on the aspirations and authority of the warring politicians.
Power corrupts. The Queen of Canada and the kings and queens of other civilized countries are incorruptible because they have no power save that which is invested in the constitution, or the set of rules under which the politicians must play their game.
Queen Elizabeth of Canada is the presence of you and me above the presence of the Prime Minister. Prime ministers may come and go but the Queen, or her offspring, remain as living symbols of our power to seat and unseat them.
The Queen may be dethroned in Canada by vote in the Houses of Parliament or by bloody involution. The fact that she has not yet been dethroned by ambitious politicians who cannot tolerate a presence higher than their own is evidence of the respect that old Canadians and new entertain for her office.
Those Members of Parliament who protest that they are faithful to their oath of allegiance to the Queen while they slowly and steadily eliminate from state documents, institutions, regiments and flags all talismans of Her Majesty’s place in the constitution are liars and hypocrites to be watched at the next election
The recent replacement on some dollar bills of the Qiren’s head with the heads of long dead prime ministers is one more of the endless proofs that some politicians desire to outrank the Throne, and so to outrank those who elect them.
Such politicians represent not the peoples brought up under the oldest system of democracy in the world but the very negation of democracy.
A little reflection on the color, dignity and festivity imparled to Canadian life by the participation in public affairs of the monarch’s personal representatives, the Governor General and the lieutenant governors of the provinces, should convince fun – loving young people that Prince Charles is a good man to follow.
The alternative is some dreary president in a business suit who appears to be the best of a bad lot on an election card, a fellow who might easily be shot by some aggrieved nut who didn’t vote for him.
I am sure all thinking young Canadians were impressed by the concluding statement in the recent 90-minute television documentary entitled The Royal Family.
The speaker said: “The strength of the Monarchy lies not in the power it gives to the Sovereign but in the power it denies to anyone else.”
