rfmcdonald | [BRIEF NOTE[ Wikipedia on the Canadian Monarchy (Reply)

After I was recently corrected for mistakenly referring to Queen Elizabeth II as Queen of the United Kingdom in reference to her role in Canada, I decided to go to Wikipedia to read about the Canadian monarchy. There is such a thing, although it's complex. I found the article on the Commonwealth realms to be particularly helpful. Canada is "one of 16 sovereign states within the Commonwealth of Nations that each have Elizabeth II as their respective monarch. The realms, though completely sovereign, are united in that they share one monarch as their own. These countries have a combined area totalling 18.8 million km² (excluding Antarctic claims), and a combined population of 131 million. All but about 2 million live in the six largest, namely the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, Papua New Guinea, New Zealand and Jamaica."

The relationship of these sovereign states has created the scenario wherein the Crown has both a separate and a shared character[dubious – discuss], being an institution that operates separately within the jurisdiction of each Commonwealth realm, with the Queen in right of each country being a distinct legal person, acting on the advice only of the government of that state. The Crown is thus unitary through its shared character, but divided in its jurisdictional operation, meaning that in different contexts, Crown may mean the Crown as shared or the Crown in each realm considered separately.

The monarchy is therefore no longer an exclusively British institution, although it may often be called British for historical reasons, for convenience, or for political (usually republican) purposes. One Canadian constitutional scholar, Dr. Richard Toporoski, stated on this: "I am perfectly prepared to concede, even happily affirm, that the British Crown no longer exists in Canada, but that is because legal reality indicates to me that in one sense, the British Crown no longer exists in Britain: the Crown transcends Britain just as much as it does Canada. One can therefore speak of 'the British Crown' or 'the Canadian Crown' or indeed the 'Barbadian' or 'Tuvaluan' Crown, but what one will mean by the term is the Crown acting or expressing itself within the context of that particular jurisdiction". Expressing this concept, through the proclamation of Elizabeth II's new titles in 1952, in each realm the Queen is known by the title appropriate for that realm; for example, in Barbados she is known as "Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, Queen of Barbados," or, simply, the Queen of Barbados.

As a consequence of this relationship, as per the preamble to the Statute of Westminster, any alterations to the line of succession to the throne must be approved by the parliaments of all the realms in order to guarantee continuity of a single monarch.[14] For example, there have been suggestions of removing the religious requirements from the Act of Settlement, which currently defines the succession.[15] In practice, since each realm is a sovereign state, this requires the voluntary cooperation of all 16 of the countries. Alternatively, a realm could choose to end its participation in the shared monarchy.

[. . .]

Though the Queen's constitutional position is virtually identical in each realm, she lives in the United Kingdom. Consequently, the constitutional duties she personally exercises as Queen of the UK are in other realms generally performed by a Governor-General, who serves as her representative. The extent to which these duties are explicitly assigned to the Governor-General, rather than the Queen, varies from realm to realm, but the Queen does act personally in right of any of her other realms when required, for example when issuing Letters Patent, or on occasions of significant political importance. Similarly, the monarch usually performs ceremonial duties in the Commonwealth realms to mark historically significant events during visits at least once every five or six years, meaning she is present in a number of her realms outside the UK every other year, or on behalf of those realms abroad. She is also represented at various ceremonial events throughout all the realms by other members of the Royal Family, such as the Queen's children, grandchildren or cousin, who also reside in the United Kingdom, but act on behalf of the government of the particular realm they're in; meaning the Royal Family also has both a unitary and divided nature. The other realms may receive two to three such visits each year.

So, it's kind of confusing but can actually be figured out. I just find it kind of sad that Canada has a monarchy but it isn't a kingdom. John A. MacDonald wanted Canada to become a kingdom, mind, but Britain resented on the grounds that it was premature and potentially upsetting to the Americans. Pity, that.