I tried to watch as little of the coronation of King Charles III as possible. I just couldn’t bear to watch a lot of it.
Something about celebrating the concentration of coercive government power in the hands of a single fallible human being ― even if it is merely titular and ceremonial as in Britain today ― rubs me the wrong way.
Watching a king ascend to his throne should have reminded everyone of many of the capricious actions taken by state governors and the president during COVID. While some of the actions were taken to protect public health, many others were issued accompanied by the stench of dictatorial, monarchial arrogance made purely for partisan political purposes.
Americans really don’t like that sort of thing. They shouldn’t, anyway.
The pomp and circumstance during the 10 minutes of the coronation which I did see was enjoyable in a fairy tale sort of way. Gold chariots, white horses, kings and queens with crowns on their heads and princes and princesses and ladies-in-waiting ― the only things missing were Merlin the Magician and Cinderella.
But please, let’s leave it that. Let’s keep any admiration of royalty relegated to the world of fiction and children’s literature. God forbid that someone like President Joe Biden watched the whole spectacle and started thinking the average citizen wants him to act like a king.
He might just wake up one morning and do it, you know.
King Charles III himself looked uncomfortable as heck walking through Westminster Abbey in those heavy red robes. He walked stiffly through a door under the vestibule after his coronation and came out “magically” (?) on the other side with a mace in each hand as if he was in an elementary school play.
Did you catch the part about King Charles III being the “Supreme Governor of the Church of England”? Would any sane American citizen want to see President Biden, Trump or Obama ― during their inaugural ceremony, no less ― sworn in as our “Supreme Governor of Religion” on top of being given the code to the nuclear football and veto power over Congress?
No, thank you. The separation of church and state was proclaimed by President Thomas Jefferson in 1801 in a letter to a Danbury, Connecticut, congregation of Baptists who were worried he might institute a national religion. He adamantly said no and promised them they would have freedom to worship as they saw fit as would everyone else in America. The intent was to protect churches from state interference, not the other way around.
Think an infringement of religious belief could never happen in America? President Barack Obama’s Justice Department violated this important tenet in 2015 when they went after The Little Sisters of the Poor, a group of nuns who objected to being forced to prescribe contraceptives under Obamacare.
We are seeing ever-increasing assaults on religious liberty from left-wing activists now in government who are seeking to undermine and overturn many of the basic bedrock principles of faith, family and patriotism in our schools, universities and public discourse. They have determined that faith, family and patriotism are sexist, racist and dangerous by their very nature. They are seeking to complete the job President Obama promised on election night 2008 when he said: “Change has come to America.”
And now his vice president is trying to help complete that mission by being the most socialist president ever. Joe Biden is making singular executive decisions that affect all of our lives as if he were a king ― and we are all suffering because of his decisions.
On Nov. 29, 1803, British foreign minister Anthony Merry went to the White House with U.S. Secretary of State James Madison to present his credentials to President Thomas Jefferson. Merry arrived decked out in pretentious, haughty British diplomatic uniform ― blue dress coat with gold braid, white breeches and white silk stockings, a plumed hat and dress sword.
Jefferson greeted them in “slippers down at the heels” clothed in a worn-out coat, breeches, linen shirt and woolen stockings. Jefferson represented the new egalitarian spirit of America where every person was as important as the next and certainly not subservient to anyone both foreign and domestic.
Certainly not representatives of foreign kings. Merry, while insulted, got the picture about the new American Republic and reported back to London.
The point of this critique is not to be disrespectful of the customs of our best and longest-serving ally. The point is to urge everyone not to get too caught up in how “wonderful” British royalty is ― because concentrated government executive power in the hands of a single executive has led to more problems, not less in American history.
