THE INFANT PRINCESS

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1064, 30 August 1930, Page 8

THE INFANT PRINCESS

IS SHE FOURTH IN THE 1 ROYAL SUCCESSION 1m: consmuuomu. Posmon I Is there any reason for dam-m“. the accuracy of the belief that the Duchess of York's baby daughtgr is fourth in ‘succession to th. Throne of Britain? i The constitutional position has been linterestingly stated to a Dunedin paper by Mr. John Lang, lecturer 0n constitutional history in the Univer—sity of Otago. He said:— ' “The relevant facts are these;‘By ‘ the 1701 Act of Settlement, the Crown ‘was settled on the Electress of Hanover, Sophia, and the heirs of her body, These are the very words which in the case of land would create an entailed estate. In the case of the descent of land, according to the common lawn: England, if a. man dies leaving no sons and only one daughter. the daughter, of course, inherits his land. But ifhe leaves more than one daughter, the daughters take ts co-parteners. “The descent of a peerage follows the same rule; but a. peerage mot be held in partnership or joint tenancy. For instance. if a baron dies leaving no sons and two or more daughters the title remains in abey. ance until only one daughter remains, whereupon she becomes baroness in her own right. In early times, upon such a contingency arising. there is evidence to show that the King, being the fountain of honour. sometime; chose one of the daughters to succeed to the title without waiting for the death of the other sister; but until the King did exercise such a prerog‘. tive the title was in abe'yance.

“There is no reason to suppose that the descent of the Crown would follow any other course than the descent of a peerage. It may be urged against this, that at the death of Henry Till., who left three children in the following order of seniority:—Mary, Elizabeth, and Edward, then Mary, the elder sister, then Elizabeth. But Henry VIII. had been specially empowered by Parliament in 1544 to dispose of his Crown by will, which he did by naming his children in that order. Even then Parliament considered it necessar*. on the accession of each of the daughters, to pass what was called an Act. of Recognition. Henry \ 111. had also by* w'ill provided that failing issue of any of his three children the Crown should go to the descendants of his younger sister Mary, to the exclusion of the descendants of his elder sister Margaret, who had married James IV. of ScotlandOn the death of Elizabeth, in spite of the provisions of Henry VIIL’s will. James VI. of Scotland, a descendant of Henry’s elder sister Margaret, succeeded to the Throne of England without any' serious opposition, which confirmed him in his ideas of Divine right. Parliament also in this ease passed an Act of Recognition, which seems to be a relic of the old system of electing a King. "It would follow, therefore, that the case of Queen Mary succeeding in priority to Queen Elizabeth does not settle any general rule of law. "Xor does the case of the two daughters of James 11. constituted a precedent. Mary, the elder daughter, certainly occupied the throne before her younger sister, but the whole proceedings were revolutionary, and Parliament settled the succession by the Bill of Rights. It is practically certain that, if William of Orange had beeu married to Anne instead of to Mary, the younger sister would have reigned .before the elder. Of course, according to hereditary right, neither should have come to the throne, as they' had a brother.

“In Anglo-Saxon times, and right down to King John, the sovereignty of England was within certain limits elective. The person chosen was always, where possible, one of the family of the previous Sovereign, chosen by the nation, but not necessarily the feudal heir. “On the coronation of a Sovereign, even at the present day, there is a trace of this practice of election. One of the first parts of the ceremony in Westminster Abbey is the presentation of the Sovereign by the Primate to the people for recognition. "The people’’ for that purpose are represented bv the bo vs of Westminster School. ’ They signify their recognition by loud acclamation (that has been well rehearsed). But, a more important trace of the elective system occurs at an earlier stage. When a Sovereign dies, there is a meeting of the great persons of the realm not the Privy Council, but members of the Privy Council, with the Lord Mayor of London and his aldermen, and. so that the nation may be full! represented, a few other gentlemen who are not Privy Councillors nor holders of any particular office and it is this mixed assemblage that proclaims the new Sovereign. "If. then. King George V., the Prince of Wales, and the Duke of 4 ork we all carried off by some cataclysmic disaster —which God forbid >t d not follow, in my opinion, that m elder daughter of the Duke of would succeed. The preservation the old elective theory would tne come In useful. The assembly of great persons of the realm , '’ ou r doubt choose and proclaim tne e daughter, but there is also the ce tainty that it would be c ° n . s f „ nJ necessary to ratify their choice proclamation by a special Parlia ary Act of Recognition. , “I have to admit that Blacksto _ Commentaries’ says that there s n difference in the descent of the from the descent of *and. and th the case of two or more caugbte ? being left, and no sons. *h® daughter succeeds. But ,’ n( j t does not quote any authorities t think I have shown that he could n > and his mere dictum is not enougn- - I see the position, in the last re Parliament has to settle the thing, and while it is probable Parliament would declare lor Duke of York’s elder living danfih that finding is not inevitable.