Long Live The Queen?
This year, as usual, millions of Britons sat down to watch the Queen's annual Christmas speech — a message of peace from the Bible for the new millenium telling her subjects to "Go forth into the world in peace…be of good courage. Hold fast that which is good."
But, reports CBS News Correspondent Elizabeth Palmer, no matter how eternal the message, many people think Protestant preaching from the Queen has no place in a modern Britain. They deem it one of several antiquated traditions that the United Kingdom would do better without.
"It's actually in the rules that nobody who's a Catholic, or a Jew or a Hindu or a Muslim can ever be King or Queen by the law of the land," said Jonathan Freedland, a reporter at the Guardian newspaper, which recently spearheaded a campaign to abolish the monarchy. "That is just straightforward discrimination, even racism."
The United Kingdom is a constitutional monarchy — although it has no written constitution. The Royal family still has a formal if largely ceremonial place in the country's government.
The Queen is still considered the chief of state, even if Prime Minister Tony Blair is the head of government, and she can dissolve Parliament to force early elections. Technically speaking, Blair and the rest of the Cabinet of Ministers carry out the Queen's executive powers.
One of the houses of Britain's Parliament, the House of Lords, until recently consisted mainly of hereditary seats for the country's earls, lords and dukes. A new plan for allotting seats is in the works, probably for calling for one-fifth of the seats to be elected and the rest appointed.
Britain's monarchy is consciously trying to improve their image with the commoners. Prince Charles, although groomed for the throne, has done his best to get down off his high horse, even agreeing to a join the cast of Britain's favorite soap opera for a brief cameo.
His son, 18-year-old Prince William, has an even surer common touch, whether it's cooking his own birthday dinner or roughing it on a youth trip in Chile.
Even William's grandmother the Queen, on a recent visit to an Australian school, joked that she couldn't bring her crown along, because, "I couldn't get it out of the Tower of London, you see."
But then there's the big bah, humbug from the Princess Royal, reports CBS News Correspondent Kimberly Dozier.
Well wishers, outside the royals' country home of Sandringham, got the royal cold shoulder from Princess Anne. Onlookers say the queen's sister grabbed a basket of flowers from a 75-year-old fan, snapping, "What a ridiculous thing to do."
The Princess then told her nieces, Fergie's two girls, to "get a move on." A San Diego woman, who'd waited five hours in the cold, said she'd learned her lesson, after watching this spectacle. "No more flowers, no more gifts." At least not for this family, reports Dozier.
Aided by incidents like that, Britons aren't buying the public relations campaign, and, according to the Guardian, they're ready for an elected head of state
"We've been very heartened by the response," said Freedland. "We think it means Britons are growing up."
Nonsense, said a voice from the House of Lords.
"She's been nearly 50 years on the throne. She's got a great sense of duty," said Lord St. John of Forsley. "People respect and admire her and there is no movement of any kind to have a republic."
Like many traditions, the monarchy is proving unexpectedly resilient. The royal family got through its biggest challenge in modern times — the death of Princess Diana — and it looks like it will take more than the republican appeals of a British newspaper to topple this throne.