BRITISH MONARCHY

Evening Star, Issue 20117, 6 March 1929, Page 2

BRITISH MONARCHY

MEDIEVAL ROUTINE A plea that the British Monarchy should he disentangled from the network of medieval routine, which encases it at present and which has caused a grave risk to the life of King George, is a feature of an _ outspoken leader on the King s illness in the ‘ National .Review.’ The introduction of typewriting and women into offices (says the 1 National Review ’) has given clerks the dictating habit, and a swollen stream of official memoranda, though thinned down in many places, eventually pours into Buckingham Palace from all corners of the earth. “In the light of recent events it is not extravagant to plead for the addition of a rubber stamp to the equipment of Buckingham Palace. Surely a less perilous solution of the" difficulty than the signature of an avalanche of documents which has accumulated during the Monarch’s illness could be found than the assembling of Slate Counsellors in the room adjoining the King’s bedchamber, while the Home Secretary stood at an intervening door and read out the prodigious Order-in-Council, setting out the elementary fact that six State Counsellors had been appointed 1 It was noted that the exertion caused an immediate rise in His Majesty’s temperature. “ The Constitution is inelastic in matters affecting the Sovereign’s convenience, and he has probably become the victim of a disease of bureaucracy, because he is hyper-conscientious and reads everything submitted to him, which is a greater burden than any man should bo asked to bear.” Reviewing the King's general character, the ‘ National Review ’ pays a tribute _ to his influence in restraining separatist movements in the dominions and assuaging class strife at Home, and it proceeds to attack bitterly the tendency of politicians to use the Monarch as a political convenience. “ Statesmen have perverted the maxim that ‘ the King can do no wrong ’ into ‘Ministers cannot do wrong.’ In matters of policy they have not played straight by the Crown. Whenever a Government does anything whereof it is ashamed, or afraid of a popular reaction, it won’t cower behind the Mnarchy, and make out that the King has some part therein, as in 1921, when the United Kingdom was disrupted. Ministers drafted effusive telegrams in (he Monarch’s name to prevent people from saying what they thought of the betrayal. “Also in the distribution of honours Ministers play very low down on the sovereign by recommending as noblemen people who cannot even be considered gentlemen. There is also a tendency to accentuate the King’s partisanship with the Government of the hour, by couching speeches Worn the Throne, in terms which make them seem a personal expression of the Monarch’s views. “ All this shows how much more strenuous is the task of King George than either that of King Edward or Queen .Victoria.”

Savings banks show a big gain lor the year, and perhaps the stockingless tad is a good thing after all.