Posted on 01/08/2007 10:30:49 AM PST by GMMAC
Whither the Scots?
John O' Sullivan
National Post
Monday, January 08, 2007
Scotland's New Year -- known as Hogmanay -- is traditionally celebrated more uproariously than any other day of the year. But New Year, 2007, includes two events in the Scottish calendar that could create an enormous hangover for the full year. Compared to Canada's own secessionist murmurings -- which have been quelled (for the moment) by Stephen Harper's clever resolution designating Quebec as a nation "within a united Canada" -- the U.K. may be in for a rough ride.
The first event on the horizon is the 300th anniversary of the 1707 Act of Union that formed the United Kingdom of Great Britain. This Union has proved to be one of the most successful political associations in history.
It led to the Anglo-Scottish enlightenment, the industrial revolution and the creation of an empire spanning the globe. Usually, it would be celebrated with the pomp and circumstance that the British have elevated to one of the fine arts.
Except for the second event. That's the May election for the devolved Scottish parliament. On present trends, this will make the Scottish National Party (SNP) the single largest party in Scotland. Alex Salmond, the SNP leader, has promised an early referendum on breaking up the Union and creating an independent Scotland. So Scotland might both celebrate the 1707 Act of Union and dissolve it in the same year.
How come? There is growing support within Scotland for independence. As well as forecasting that the SNP will be the largest party with about one-third of the total vote, opinion polls show that more Scots favour independence than oppose it. One recent poll registered 52% support for full independence.
This has surprised British politicians. Prime Minister Tony Blair thought he had headed off independence by creating a devolved Scottish parliament in a new quasifederal U.K. as his first major reform eight years ago. But all that devolution achieved in Scotland was a brief pause before Scottish nationalism resumed its upward trend. It will be hard for Scotland's other parties --Labour, the Lib-Dems and the Tories -- to resist the SNP's referendum if Scottish public opinion continues to be increasingly nationalist.
Unfortunately for Blair, moreover, Scottish devolution has had a larger impact in England than in Scotland. It created a growing awareness that the Scots felt themselves to be very different from the English and even slightly hostile to them. That in turn directed the attention of the English to certain political facts they had hitherto taken for granted but that now seemed unfair.
In particular:
- Britain's public expenditure includes a US$50-billion subsidy for Scotland. Thus, the average Scot obtains 30% more from the public expenditure than his English counterpart.
- Scottish MPs in the U.K. Parliament get to vote on all issues affecting England, but English MPs are barred from voting on issues that come under the Scottish Parliament.
- Labour is in an almost permanent minority in England, but Britain has a Labour government because of Scottish votes.
- And, finally, a high percentage of Labour cabinet ministers are Scots -- including the likely next prime minister, Gordon Brown. (Tony Blair is a Scot too, but not very noticeably.) As long as the English and Scots saw each other as primarily British, members of the same national community, such things didn't matter. Once devolution emphasized the differences between them, however, the English began to resent these transfers as unfair. Fifty-nine per cent of English voters now support Scottish independence.
Britain's main political parties are strongly opposed to any such move. Labour is opposed to Scottish independence because it would rob them of power in England (which has a population of over 50 million compared to Scotland's five million). Blair and Brown in particular are horrified by the prospect of an independent Scotland -- Blair because he would go down in history as the prime minister who presided over the breakup of the U.K., and Brown because he would cease to be prime minister in a very short time, perhaps even before he got the job.
In the coming year, we can expect a rash of official scare stories from Blair and Brown, joined on this occasion by their Tory opponents, about the dire consequences of breaking up the U.K. Don't ever underestimate the ability of a united political establishment to sway the voters. But the trend toward separatist nationalism in Britain is now strong and well-established. An irresistible force is on schedule to meet an immovable object. The outcome is unknowable.
But the lessons are already clear for the United Kingdom -- and for other multi-national and multi-ethnic polities such as Canada and the United States. National feeling, patriotism, loyalty and a sense of common allegiance exist in the hearts of men and women.
The legal bonds of even very successful political societies are as spun sugar compared to the ties that bind the heart and the imagination. Multi-national and multi-ethnic societies have to work hard at keeping these ties strong and meaningful precisely because their populations are ethnically diverse. If pride in their common nationality is allowed to decay, then different ethnic groups will soon discover their differences and resent common sacrifices. Multicultural Britain forgot this lesson.
In 1907, on the 200th anniversary of the Act of Union, Scottish independence would have struck both Scots and English as an absurd betrayal of a great heritage. This year it will be a serious choice on the ballot paper.
What will be the choices facing the American voter in 2076? Or the Canadian (and, in particular, Quebec) voter well before the 100th anniversary of Trudeau's patriated constitution? Fine words about nationhood emanating from Ottawa might not be enough to control the sort of centrifugal forces now on display in the country known, for now, as the United Kingdom.
John O'Sullivan is a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute in Washington, editor-at-large of National Review magazine and a member of Benador Associates.
© National Post 2007
The Fianna Fail and Fine Gael parties represent the great majority of the Irish population, and they are ideologically the parties that agreed to the partition of Ireland - as opposed to the bomb-throwing Sinn Fein deadenders.
If the Protestants were to vote to join the Republic, Sinn Fein would lose all rhetorical justification for terrorism and 500,000 new Protestant voters in the Republic would obliterate Sinn Fein's representation in the Dail.
Fat, drunk and stupid is no way to go through life, son.
"her first President, his entire Cabinet"
I don't think this is even technically true...but even if technically true, it is a huge exaggeration and very misleading.
Washington's ancestors on his father's side came over from England in the mid seventeenth century. I have never even heard it suggested that his mother was a Scot or or Scottish descent.
Jefferson was in Washington's cabinet - but his mother was born in London and his father was born in Virginia.
Hamilton was in Washington's cabinet - but Hamilton's mother was French, he was born in the West Indies. His father may well have been a Scot, but since he abandoned his son, and Hamilton's entire life was marked by him trying to overcome his illegitimacy, I don't think I would hold that up as an example.
Edmund Randolph was in Washington's cabinet - and though he was the son of a Scot, his father was a loyalist and returned to the homeland. Not exactly an American patriot. Don't think I would use that as an example, either.
Samuel Osgood was the final member of Washington's first cabinet. His father was English. Not sure where his mother was from, but to say he was a Scot or descended from a Scot is a real stretch.
Obviously John Adams (VP under Washington, not a cabinet member, but one of the most important architects of independence) descended from a long line of Englishmen. Franklin doesn't have any Scottish blood in him, either.
All that said, clearly the Scottish Enlightenment was enormously important for America and John Witherspoon was a true Scot and those are important facts. In fact, there are plenty of reasons to say why Scotland was important to American independence. That is true.
But to say that Washington and all of his cabinet were descendents of Scotland is simply false or so grossly exaggerated that has no meaning whatsoever.
Let 'em go.
The Scots would still be living in huts and sh*tting in holes if it weren't for the Brits.
Yeah but we keep the whisky and golf!
Fat, drunk and stupid is no way to go through life, son.
Thanks Dad, I wont make the same mistakes as you.
I want the Scots to be independent of the brits. They are not at all brits. They should not be under the heel of the "Crown".
Has any country produced more first rate minds at least in proportion to size than England?
From a legal point of view Scotland was an independent nation identified as Scots most likely from the kingship of Giric in 878 until the Act of Union in 1707.
But from 1290-1357 there were dynastic conflicts in Scotland that resulted in English possession of some Scots territory and the existence of Scotland as an English client state.
That ended in 1357, making Scotland independent in both law and fact.
To accept the Union is voluntary one must obviously ignore the genocidal realities of little matters like the massacre that was Culloden and the Highland Clearances:
The Act of Union took place in 1707.
The Battle of Culloden took place in 1746.
The Highland Clearances began in 1725 or 1762 depending on your definition.
All this took place well after the Act of Union, not before it.
It is obvious that the Highlanders opposed Union. It is also obvious that they comprised less than 25% of the population.
The Union was voted on in the Scots Parliament and the Lowlanders, being three times as numerous as the Highlanders, carried the vote.
Perhaps Florence or Athens.
You have to go all the way back to the days of the city state!
Many, in fact. Look at the Greek city states. Samos produced Pythagoras, Aesop, Epicurus, Aristarchus, and Theodorus.
On an island that currently has 54k people.
The "days of the city-state" were not that long ago, historically speaking. Venice was until nearly 1800.
I think a perusal of ancient Greek history would answer that question for you.
I got into this conversation late. Sorry.
The contribution of the Greeks to what we are today should not be dismissed. The Scots are incredibly important to America, for sure...but the superlatives that are thrown around sometimes are not all that helpful. Scotland is not the most important. It's important. But it's not the mostest importantest of them all.
The present situation will change mightily in the subsequent generations due to the high Catholic birth rate in N.I. The present balance between Protestants and Catholics is about sixty-forty. It will be closer to fifty percent Catholic in twenty years or so at the present rate.
How did that slip past my radar? Links?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.