Canadian Republic Research List: April 2011

Prominent Canadian Republican Randall White’s monthly ‘Canadian Republican Research List’ providing a timeline of Canadian Republican-related news events/articles/happenings with appropriate links by date.

(1) April 6, 2011 … A more striking resemblance: Canadian Mint releases coin to mark Royal Wedding… and it’s a better likeness of William and Kate than the British one : http://bit.ly/l0mZ7k

(2) April 11, 2011 … “In our forthcoming book Democratizing the Constitution, my co-authors … and I document how prime ministers have come to exercise excessive control over parliamentary procedure … Particular attention needs to be paid to the prime minister’s powers related to confidence, prorogation and dissolution … Canada has not developed clear rules, guidelines or expectations with respect to the use of these powers, as New Zealand and the United Kingdom have. New Zealand, for example, has adopted guidelines to establish that if a government loses the confidence of the House, the Governor General is to ascertain whether an alternative government can be chosen from the same House : http://bit.ly/iMWz8Z

(3) April 12, 2011 … Canada  will be the scene of the Royal couple’s first official overseas tour, with the country’s Conservative prime minister Stephen Harper pledging to show them the “special hospitality and warmth reserved for members of the Royal Family” : http://bit.ly/mODVCz

(4) April; 13, 2011 … It’s time to talk about abolishing the monarchy, By Ian Bushfield… The monarchy is out of date for Canada, and it is time that we close this chapter on our history and work toward becoming the Republic of Canada … Ian Bushfield is president of the B.C. Humanist Association :  http://bit.ly/larCNB

(5) April 13, 2011 … Canada Post to unveil royal wedding stamps : http://bit.ly/mmBrlU

(6) April 14, 2011 … Push to sever ties has never gained ground in Canada … “Canadian citizens, the general public as a whole, don’t harbour any dislike or resentment toward the monarchy or the royals themselves. What it’s all about is how we perceive Canada in terms of its evolution,” said Tom Freda, director of Citizens for a Canadian Republic. “To a lot of us, it means we haven’t taken that last step to putting colonialism in the history books where it belongs and looking ahead to the 21st century as a country that doesn’t owe anything to another country” : http://bit.ly/ijGe5b

(7) April 15, 2011 … Johann Hari: This royal frenzy should embarrass us all … Republicans are not the Grinch, trying to ruin the ‘big day’ for William and Kate. We are proposing a positive vision : http://ind.pn/ipK5Yj

(8) April 16, 2011 … Coyle: Royal wedding lacks ‘relevance’ to Canadians : http://bit.ly/iSHMaa
(9) April 17, 2011 … The Royal Wedding – They Say I Do… I Say We Don’t : http://bit.ly/lJy3hg

(10) April 17, 2011 … A new Canada? Harper wraps himself in a different kind of flag … The Conservatives overhauled the country’s citizenship guide in 2009 to reflect such values. The new guide makes little reference to the environment or health care, while highlighting the monarchy and Canada’s military :http://bit.ly/kc4vz7

(11) April 18, 2011 … Harper nixes Canadian debate on monarchy succession : http://ind.pn/ipK5Yj

(12) April 19, 2011 … Meet the independents …  Leslie … Bory is a 41-year-old former machinist from Waterford putting forward an agenda that includes a “Canada-first” policy … “Canada should determine its own future,” Bory said. “We’ve been giving too many things away to foreign companies.” … Bory said one of the first things Canada could do to set its own path is severe ties with the British monarchy … “I don’t think unelected foreigners should have anything to do with our policy,” he said : http://bit.ly/laCizw

(13) April 18, 2011 … Beware the In-Laws … Does Kate Middleton really want to marry into a family like this? … By Christopher Hitchens :http://slate.me/k354h4

(14) April 23, 2011 … Conrad Black … For Canada, the royal connection is becoming gradually more tenuous. The concept of a non-residential monarchy for a serious country was always going to become a difficult one. Canada is a G7 country, and having a chief of state who is only here for a couple of weeks every two or three years creates problems. And the stand-in, a governor-general, is bearer of a traditionally colonial title. I have long advocated an update to such arrangements … the monarchy could play a role, such as providing a co-chief of state in the senior Commonwealth countries apart from Britain, to serve alongside a domestically chosen associate head of state. Canada could thus have the British monarch and head of the Commonwealth as co-chief of state, operating with a president/governor-general, who could tacitly represent the republicans in the country. [MMMM … IT MAY BE THAT MR. BLACK HAS BEEN SPENDING TOO MUCH TIME IN JAIL LATELY! BUT AT LEAST WE REPUBLICANS WOULD GET “TACIT REPRESENTATION”!] : http://bit.ly/mBPie7

(15) April 25, 2011 … The big royal issue: how would Prince William’s budgie smugglers go down in Tuvalu? … It’s easy to imagine the Commonwealth seething with republican fury. But even in Australia apathy keeps the monarchy alive … The inevitable pressure in most places will be to end royal ties once the Queen dies – and as an Australian as well as a British citizen, that is what I would favour. Prince Charles has shown a droopy lack of originality in engaging with places where his mother’s death would automatically make him king : http://bit.ly/mCKBUR

(16) April 26, 2011 … Royal wedding: Is the monarchy relevant in today’s society? : http://bit.ly/juEeQ3

(17) April 27, 2011 … Love it or loathe it, royal wedding buzz a catalyst for monarchy debate in Canada : http://bit.ly/jDmrkk

(18) April 27, 2011 … Monarchy such a waste … By ancestry, I am part British. Yet I don’t want Prince Charles’s face on our currency or postage when he becomes monarch. I don’t want to cover the costs of their royal visits. And I think it is outrageous how much attention is spent on the so-called Wedding of the Millennium : http://bit.ly/m5EwZi

(19) April 28, 2011 … Intolerance in the highest office in the land : http://bit.ly/lmCvPV

(20) April 28, 2011 …  Windsor Knot … Jonathan Freedland … the power of young Elizabeth’s brief scenes in The King’s Speech  is not solely chronological. It is not only that she was around a long time ago; it is that she was around then, during what Churchill predicted would be known thereafter as Britain’s finest hour. She is the last living connection to an episode—the island race standing up to Hitler—that has become the foundation story, almost the creation myth, of modern Britain … This is the bedrock on which the current monarchy stands. While the Queen lives, no republican will be able to shake it. After she is gone, she will leave a gap that her son, her grandson, and his new wife—no matter how charming—will have to struggle to fill : http://bit.ly/m4GyvY

(21) April 28, 2011 … If not abolish the monarchy, at least modernize it : http://bo.st/kxRfDj

(22) April 28, 2011 … Royals a bunch of right Charlies over Chaser ban … by Greg Barns : http://bit.ly/mkRjTi

(23) April 28, 2011 … Canadian democracy in need of a tune-up : http://bit.ly/lNj7Yt

(24) April 28, 2011 … Group tries to make monarchy an election issue … None of the major Canadian political parties endorse cutting ties with the monarchy, and debate over the future of the monarchy in Canada has not figured prominently in the current campaign … Citizens for a Canadian Republic, which advocates cutting the link between the Governor General and the monarchy, tried to change that with the release of its “voter guide” this week : http://bit.ly/lHS1qk

(25) April 28, 2011 … PM’s puzzling reticence on the monarchy .. coming out in favour of some new kind of independent Canadian head of state may be a much better issue for all the more progressive parties in federal politics today than any of them yet seem to appreciate : http://bit.ly/mSm8r5

(26) April 29, 2011 … PM, Governor General extend congratulations to royals : http://bit.ly/l6Kpar