The mother of the Magistrate who sent the Yeomanry in at Peterloo on 16th August 1819 owned a horse named Church and King.
Its a reminder that cornerstones of the Tory Party going back to before 1834 when the ‘modern’ Party was formed was support for the monarchy and the Church of England.
Such is the ideological crisis of Toryism in 2024 that this appears to have been abandoned. The new Government has introduced a Bill in the Commons to remove the remaining 92 Hereditary Peers. It is not proposing to remove the 26 Anglican Peers including the Archbishop of Canterbury at the moment.
Former Tory Minister Gavin Williamson is proposing an amendment to remove the Bishops. The Times reports that Williamson is Church of England but his children are Catholic. There of course remain barriers to a Catholic becoming monarch.
In so far as socialist and republicans have an interest here its surely that the Tories seem to be prepared to divorce themselves from a constitutional arrangement that is at the centre of their own history.
Leave a Reply