Home > The Magazine > Cartoons

Saturday 4 July 2009

Subscribe now

Dare to dream and make your ultimate trip a reality

The latest culture as recommended by our staff

Liz Anderson

Liz Suggests

Email registration

Free weekly email update

Great products and special offers for Spectator readers

Click here for great value events

The price of liberty

Adrian Hilton

Saturday, 8th November 2003

Adrian Hilton says that the Act of Settlement must not be repealed, because a Roman Catholic monarchy would destroy our religious and civil liberties

Across the whole gamut of constitutional issues that have preoccupied New Labour, many consider that the only justifiable reform would have been the repeal of the Act of Settlement 1701, to remove the discriminatory anti-Catholic provisions; to eliminate the institutionalised bigotry of the constitution.

In recent years there have been numerous such calls from Roman Catholic members of the Northern Ireland Assembly, Members of the Scottish Parliament, the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland, the Archbishop of York, and also from many politicians — notably Lord Forsyth of Drumlean, who described the Act as Britain’s ‘grubby little secret’. The Guardian adopted the mission, challenging the Act as being incompatible with the Human Rights Act 1998, and, according to Lord Ashdown, the Prince of Wales is also known to want the religious restrictions on the monarchy changed.

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 Next page

More articles from: Adrian Hilton | this section

Print this article | Email to a friend | Permalink | Comment

Subscribe Now 12 issues for £12 in the UK : Gift subscriptions : Overseas subscriptions

Post this entry to: del.icio.us | Digg | Newsvine | NowPublic | Reddit

Immortalised in print

Geoffrey Wheatcroft

Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, 2001-2004, edited by Lawrence Goldman

Real Life

Melissa Kite

Writer’s block

The Turf

Robin Oakley

Be patient

To become an extremist, hang around with people you agree with

Cass Sunstein

Cass Sunstein — co-author of the hugely influential Nudge and an adviser to President Obama — unveils his new theory of ‘group polarisation’, and explains why, when like-minded people spend time with each other, their views become not only more confident but more extreme

Who would have thought a herd could moonwalk?

Mark Earls

The acclaimed web theorist, Mark Earls, says that the death of Michael Jackson unleashed the extremes of collective action: mass mourning and sick jokes

Insanity has always been integral to New Labour

Martin Bright

Martin Bright says that the party labels its enemies as ‘mad’ for Freudian reasons: ‘projecting’ its own collective and individual mental disorders upon foes and rebels alike

The real sickness is Labour’s, not Brown’s

Fraser Nelson

Fraser Nelson says that the governing party has lost its hunger for office — and is now unhealthily dominated by the mega-union Unite and its political chieftain, Charlie Whelan

This papal visit is a good time to reprieve Pius XII

Simon Caldwell

Simon Caldwell says that the wartime Pope was no Nazi sympathiser: on the contrary, he was a thorn in Hitler’s side and a protector of persecuted Jews

Blairism has destroyed the Labour party

David Selbourne

David Selbourne says that New Labour won elections but eradicated all that was good in the party’s traditions. The Cameroons should learn from this terrible lesson

Thirteen, Alfie? I’d almost given up on sex by the age of 13

Rod Liddle

Rod Liddle recalls his own childhood fumblings and says that the case of Alfie Patten proves nothing much has changed. If Britain is ‘broken’, it always was