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Not long ago some of you were surprised to find out that monarchism is a vibrant part of the modern conservative thought, while others reacted with understanding. This is a good explanation why someone of libertarian persuasion might be a monarchist. It is similar to how my views evolved from conservative libertarianism as well.
The truth is that there is no perfect form of government because there are no perfect people. The monarchy overlooks this by portraying monarchs are being supreme people without flaws. A look at history shows great contempt for “commoners” in monarchies.
I will admit that our current situation is far from perfect. But it’s worth noting that these authors can write such articles and people can post them online without fear of legal punishment in the U.S. That’s not the case in much of the world.
What the British Monarchy does in particular is to be a point of "Britishness" for the people, the protectors of the Faith and Culture.
Here in America we have tried to make the Holidays fill that role July 4th, Memorial Day, Etc, but since the Balkanization of America these have lost their potency.
If anyone is interested I have many links at the bottom of my homepage regarding Monarchism.
I’ll stick with a constitutional republic, even with all its flaws.
You’re in big trouble now.
The problem with monarchy is that it turns power into a venereal disease, and eventually every family produces a Paris Hilton.
Unfortunately, the concept of monarchy flies in the face of the equality and individual rights that are our divine right. Only those who ascribe to the heresy of predestination would contend that God pre-chooses winners, losers, kings and peasants.
I would disagree with every part of this, starting with the axioms.
To begin with, democracy is all about voting at the lowest level. And more shouldn’t be read into democracy until this is understood. This is because, while most people equate democracy with “freedom” and “liberty”, the truth is that those are just necessary side-effects of the biggest selling point of democracy. “Efficiency”.
Democracy is a just plain, better way of doing things, than any other system.
I’ll illustrate this with a recent example of the emergence of democracy in China. It began with some popular TV game shows that were aired nationally, even in isolated, rural parts of China.
Those game shows demonstrated something that even the most uneducated peasant instantly noted: voting. And before the government noticed it, and prohibited any voting on game shows in the future, the cat had been let out of the bag.
Ah, but then what happened? In collectivized farms, where typically a lower level functionary would show up, and start issuing orders, these farmers began to argue about the orders, because they knew better than the functionary, who knew less than did the farmers about farming.
The functionary might listen to them, but then said, “Do it my way”, to which the farmers suddenly chimed in: “Hey! Let’s *vote* on it!”, and the farmers would outvote him.
Eek! The system is overthrown.
But the smarter of the functionaries soon realized that the farmers did indeed know better. And this resulted in better yields and exceeded quotas. And the supervisors of the functionaries praised them for their good work.
Lesson #1. Democracy is efficient. This is how you get more democrats.
However, democracy only works a limited part of the way up the hierarchical tree. This is because each level of the hierarchy has a different perspective on what is happening. At the ground level, what might seem right may turn out to be wrong, when seen from a different perspective.
And there are a lot of decisions to be made, which can overwhelm democracy. For this reason, beyond a certain point, if you are wise, a modified version of democracy comes into play, called republican-democracy, or representative democracy.
But republican-democracy needs to recognize that any body of people formed into a government, will look out for their own power and needs first. So they must be balanced with competing bodies of people to prevent the representatives from becoming tyrants.
Paleo Conservatives??
I read that flavor of Libertarian dribble year ago for a time. Until I realized what they were about.
“Chronicles” - Thomas Fleming
Catholic Libertarian defenders of Monarchy as an acceptable form of government.
Total Rubbish that I thought ended over a century ago.
“Divine Right of Kings” Garbage!!!!
You get NO Traction with me with this nonsense...
“No King but Jesus” was clearly understood at the time of the American Revolution. Monarchists did not build this nation and did all they could to prevent it’s existence.
Libertarians who believe that monarchy will do away with cronyism forget that cronyism -- patronage, clientism -- is at the heart of monarchic systems (just as cronyism exists in republics and democracies).
Whatever the name of the system, there's no getting away from oligarchy. Some people are closer to the centers of power and use that to their advantage. I'm not sure that monarchy has more safeguards against that kind of corruption than republics do.
Moreover, the spirit of the age is democratic. Monarchies today either keep out of the way and follow election results, or they irritate people and get overthrown.
In America there are no special classes such as royalty and aristocracy that would lead to an inequality of class.
He could just as conceivably be a thoroughgoing bastard, with no form of redress for the people.
Imagine 10-20 years of Obama.
point.set.match.
No doubt the best and most stable form of government is a benevolent monarchy.
The problem is, until Shilo come, there is no such thing.
Democracy means government by the uneducated, while aristocracy means government by the badly educated.”
GK Chesterton
N.Y. Times, Feb. 1, 1931
King is a word hateful to any free man’s ears.
Bend the knee if that feels safe to you; knee bender.
I will stand on my feet as a free man.
Arguing against democracy just shows the authors ignorance. We are not a democracy.
Slavery: A friend to Liberty.
Dictatorship: A friend to Liberty.
Hereditary Autocracy: A friend to Liberty.
The Divine Right of Kings: a political theology.
By the right of DNA they do rule us: An idiots guide to why the royals are better than us and have a right to rule us (and why we are so much better off).
A bootlickers guide to the Monarchy: How many boot licks are appropriate for a Baron, how many for a Duke, etc.
The Right of the First Night: Why it is better that one of our Monarchist Royalty impregnates your new bride.
The Left already has a ‘Monarchy’, they’re called The Kennedy Family.
All of the same arguments for having a Monarch could have been made to justify Germany having a “Fuhrer” in the 30s.