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Prince Harry's engagement shows British monarchy has moved on from scandals of past

By Michael Holden

 

Britain's Prince Harry visits the Terrence Higgins Trust charity's HIV self-test pop-up shop in Hackney, London, Britain, November 15, 2017. REUTERS/Matt Dunham/Pool

 

LONDON (Reuters) - King Edward VIII sacrificed his throne and Queen Elizabeth's sister Margaret gave up her one true love, but for Prince Harry marrying a divorcee is no longer a bar to being a royal or following his heart.

 

On Monday, Harry, fifth-in-line to the British throne, announced he was to wed his girlfriend, divorced U.S. actress Meghan Markle, with the blessing of his grandmother, the queen.

 

British social attitudes have been transformed in recent decades but the monarchy has been bound by a more traditional set of Christian values.

 

So the queen's approval is a stark demonstration of how much the monarchy has also changed and modernised in the last 80 years when the idea of a royal marrying someone who was divorced was inconceivable.

 

"It's extraordinary how far we've come since the 1930s," said royal biographer Claudia Joseph. "In less than a century times have changed beyond all recognition."

 

Famously, Harry's great-great-uncle Edward VIII set off a constitutional crisis in 1936 by insisting on marrying twice-divorced American socialite Wallis Simpson to the horror of the British establishment, the government and the Church of England, which the monarch nominally heads.

 

It was dubbed "the greatest love story of the 20th century" and Edward abdicated after just 11 months on the throne and ended up living in France, meaning Elizabeth's father George VI unexpectedly became king.

 

"You must believe me when I tell you that I have found it impossible to carry the heavy burden of responsibility and to discharge my duties as king as I would wish to do without the help and support of the woman I love," Edward said in his abdication speech.

 

Such attitudes were still prevalent two decades later. In 1955, Elizabeth's younger glamorous sister Margaret was forced to call off her proposed marriage to a dashing air force officer, Group Captain Peter Townsend.

 

Although a royal equerry, Townsend was still deemed an unsuitable husband for the queen's sister because he was divorced and he was sent off to Brussels by Buckingham Palace.

 

"MARRIAGE IS INDISSOLUBLE"

 

"I would like it to be known that I have decided not to marry Group Captain Peter Townsend," Margaret said in a sad announcement to the nation. "Mindful that Christian marriage is indissoluble and conscious of my duty to the Commonwealth, I have resolved to put these considerations before others."

 

While divorce was considered unfathomable in those days, it has since become a common feature for the Windsors. Of Elizabeth's four children, three of their marriages have ended in divorce, most spectacularly that of Harry's father, heir-to-the-throne Prince Charles and his first wife Princess Diana.

 

They divorced in 1996, 15 years after their fairytale wedding and a year before she was killed in a car crash in Paris and Charles went on to wed another divorcee Camilla Parker Bowles in 2005.

 

Camilla was someone who he had first considered marrying in the early 1970s but who royal courtiers had considered unacceptable while she was not keen on taking on the role herself at the time.

 

However Charles and Camilla could not marry in church, and the queen, who holds strong religious beliefs and has taken her role as Supreme Governor of the Church of England very seriously, declined to attend the civil ceremony.

 

The Church of England had only ruled three years earlier that a divorced person could "in exceptional circumstances" marry again in church while their former spouse was still alive.

 

Joseph said Charles's second marriage had paved the way for Harry.

 

"I think the dilemma came when Prince Charles married the Duchess of Cornwall," she told Reuters. "That was a hard thing for the queen to deal with. Somehow they had to marry without compromising her role as head of the church."

 

Harry and Meghan's union, like all those of the first six royals in direct line of succession, must be approved by the queen under the 2013 Succession to the Crown Act, which replaced an even more prescriptive law dating back to the 18th century.

 

"The Queen and The Duke of Edinburgh are delighted for the couple and wish them every happiness," Buckingham Palace said in a statement.

 

(Editing by Guy Faulconbridge and Toby Chopra)

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2017-11-28

[Somtamnication]

Sorry, but whenever an American marries a UK royal, disaster happens. History does repeat itself.

[canuckamuck]

They are not mentioning the racial angle, which I am sure would have been a pretty big deal 80 years ago as well.

[Samui Bodoh]

I find this article hilarious; its 2017. Does anyone care if someone was divorced? Are you going to ask about her virginity next?

 

If Harry was planning on marrying a gay, vegan, nudist, member of Scientology, I could understand a question or two, but a divorcee?

 

Who cares?

 

[BuaBS]

56 minutes ago, Samui Bodoh said:

If Harry was planning on marrying a gay, vegan, nudist, member of Scientology, I could understand a question or two, but a divorcee?

Really ? Vegan and nudist in the same sentence as gay & scientology ?

[SheungWan]

1 hour ago, Samui Bodoh said:

I find this article hilarious; its 2017. Does anyone care if someone was divorced? Are you going to ask about her virginity next?

 

If Harry was planning on marrying a gay, vegan, nudist, member of Scientology, I could understand a question or two, but a divorcee?

 

Who cares?

 

An awfully large number of people do care and want to talk about it. Check the Sunday papers this weekend for confirmation.

[NanLaew]

1 hour ago, SheungWan said:

An awfully large number of people do care and want to talk about it. Check the Sunday papers this weekend for confirmation.

A yes... the famously parochial British Sunday press with its colour supplements, motoring advice and vacation pull-outs.

 

It's a short-term diversion from the daily grind of obfuscation and blind-leading-the-blind media buffoonery masquerading as experience that is surrounding the huge imponderables of Brexit... or non-Brexit depending on which way your kilt is tilted.

 

When it comes to the people that truly are all wound up about these Royal intrigues in the making, the "awfully large number of people" isn't really as big as they make it out to be. But they still are pretty awful.

 

37 minutes ago, car720 said:

Yes in those days nobody could marry a ginger in case they turned out to be Scottish.

Post Of The Day sir!

[NanLaew]

3 hours ago, Somtamnication said:

Sorry, but whenever an American marries a UK royal, disaster happens. History does repeat itself.

Citation needed.

[tolsti]

I hope she has good accident insurance.

[graemeaylward]

Isn't it wonderful to be able to discuss the British Royal family, without worrying about being banged up for 10 years. Some lessons could be learned here! Brits, in recent times, have always been allowed to openly discuss the monarchy and as far as I am aware the sky hasn't fallen in yet!


Sent from my iPad using Thaivisa Connect

[toofarnorth]

Very old joke. WW2 era.

Wallis Simpson hails a cab

" Kings Cross driver "

"  Is he ,sorry to hear that madam "

 

[tolsti]

I hope she has good accident insurance.

[Enoon]

5 hours ago, Somtamnication said:

Sorry, but whenever an American marries a UK royal, disaster happens. History does repeat itself.

 

The abdication of Edward VIII was a good thing all round.

 

He was a Nazi supporter, irresponsible and incapable of maintaining the sort of "composure" required of a British monarch at that time.

 

But he lived happily ever after out of the way, with his American divorcee wife, to whom he was devoted, as she was to him.

 

 

Edited November 28, 2017 by Enoon

[Enoon]

1 hour ago, graemeaylward said:

Isn't it wonderful to be able to discuss the British Royal family, without worrying about being banged up for 10 years. Some lessons could be learned here! Brits, in recent times, have always been allowed to openly discuss the monarchy and as far as I am aware the sky hasn't fallen in yet!


Sent from my iPad using Thaivisa Connect

 

In truth, believe it or not, the LM laws of Thailand apply to all Heads of State and Monarchs.

 

Dissing them, while one is in Thailand, is equally punishable in Thailand.

 

 

[yardrunner]

4 hours ago, Samui Bodoh said:

I find this article hilarious; its 2017. Does anyone care if someone was divorced? Are you going to ask about her virginity next?

 

If Harry was planning on marrying a gay, vegan, nudist, member of Scientology, I could understand a question or two, but a divorcee?

 

Who cares?

 

yes who cares and who cares about the members of  this dysfunctional family who are an irrelevance in the UK now

[NanLaew]

1 hour ago, graemeaylward said:

Isn't it wonderful to be able to discuss the British Royal family, without worrying about being banged up for 10 years. Some lessons could be learned here! Brits, in recent times, have always been allowed to openly discuss the monarchy and as far as I am aware the sky hasn't fallen in yet!


Sent from my iPad using Thaivisa Connect

Yes, but for all her shortcomings including pension freezing and freezing rain, fair Albion and her extremities that are variously occupied by the blue-faced, shillelagh-toting and singing-in-the-valley tribes of the realm is a far, far superior nation despite the civil wars and reformations that were ultimately required to get the inveterate palace-dwellers and their sycophants to pay attention to the serfs.

[JAG]

Very old joke. WW2 era.
Wallis Simpson hails a cab
" Kings Cross driver "
"  Is he ,sorry to hear that madam "
 

My mother, (God rest her soul) told of singing:
"Hark the herald angels sing,
Mrs Simpson's pinched our king."

Sent from my KENNY using Thailand Forum - Thaivisa mobile app

[marko kok prong]

The young Hewitt lad looks in fine fettle.