It's an interesting result. Perhaps we might dissect it.Nearly four in 10 young adults want elected UK head of state, poll finds
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/202 ... coronation
Let us for a moment assume that the Royal Family has rejoined the British Aristocracy, from whence it sprang. They no longer have any part to play in British constitutional law.
I raise problem 1. The monarch is still going to be head of state for a dozen or two other nation states around the world, like Australia and Canada and New Zealand and Gibraltar and the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands and quite likely Bermuda. Let me check. "His Majesty Charles the Third, by the Grace of God, King of Antigua and Barbuda and His other Realms and Territories, Head of the Commonwealth." And so on for Belize, Grenada, Jamaica, Papua New Guinea, Saints Christopher and Nevis, Lucia, Vincent and the Grenadines, the Solomon Islands and Tuvalu. God save the King.
Do these four in 10 young adults want an elected UK head of state while leaving the Royal Family in charge of all that, or are we looking at a major upheaval here?
I raise problem 2. What exactly is the monarch's job at the moment in Britain? He is Sovereign, and as such personally possesses sovereign immunity from prosecution for any offense real or imagined, actual or defensible, capital federal or trivial. He can never be prosecuted for littering, speeding or mass murder. He is immune.
He is Commander-in-Chief of the British Armed Forces, Supreme Head of the Church of England, and doubtless other things as well.
So problem 2 is, do we cart all these responsibilities together to a new elected equivalent position in the British Constitution, or do we have lots of elected people doing different bits? Do we really want an elected Command-in-Chief, for example?
Then there's oaths of allegiance. These are made by individuals to the Sovereign as an individual, not as an office. Here, for example, is the oath made by every police officer in the country: "I... of... do solemnly and sincerely declare and affirm that I will well and truly serve the King in the office of constable" etc etc. The list of people who give the oath of allegiance on Wikipedia is very long and has a lot of important people on it, like all those police officers. And members of His Majesty's Armed Forces except Royal Naval officers. And all the Members of Parliament. And so on. Are these oaths going to lapse and have no replacement? Are we going to clutch our breasts every morning and salute the flag while announcing our allegiance instead? So far we've never looked quite that ridiculous but there's time still. As a subject of His Majesty I am deemed to have sworn the oath by reason of being His Majesty's loyal subject, and I have been lawfully obliged to swear it on demand since reaching my twelfth birthday (though this being Britain and everything being taken on trust, the demand has never been made). In less stable times the oath was demanded of all adult males on pain of fines and imprisonment. I'm not actually sure whether it was administered to any women.