Absentee Monarchs.

Press, Volume LXIII, Issue 18920, 8 February 1927, Page 8

Absentee Monarchs.

A cable printed yesterday morning: suggesting that the King and Queen might go to Ottawa raises the interesting question of the arrangements that have to be made when Sovereigns leave home. In the picturesque days when an English monarch' might at any moment go looting in Qascony or sail off to Palestine to try conclusions with the Saracen, it was the custom for him to make his political last will and testament before he left, since in those days war had its Royal risks. There have been many ways of deputising Sovereigns in the history of England. Up to the reign of Henry 111. there was always a Justiciar who took over the functions of an absent King; after this custodes rcgni— making a sort of Council of Regency—were appointed, and in the absence of William 111., after the death of Mary, these were replaced by Lords Justices, who were last appointed in 1821. During Queen Victoria's reign, when the conviction was losing ground that the world was peopled by Englishmen and "bloody furrineers," it began to be realised that a trip abroad by Royalty was not such a hazardous undertaking after all. When, therefore, the Queen decided to pay a friendly visit to the King of the French in 1813, the Crown Law Officers went into the matter and decided that there was no need to go to the bother and expense of Lords Justices every lime a Sovereign crossed the Channel. The Atlantic is of course a little wider than the Channel, but Sir William Anson's statement of the cose still stands:

"The fact that the Sovereign is absent from the realm does not impair the validity of any executive act done during such absence; and modern facilities of communication have enabled the King to give the Eoyal Assent to Bills by Commission, and to transact other business without inconvenience to the conduct of government during his visits to the Continent."'