Ummm Charles, about that train thingy you arrived on…

Queen Charles has about as much credibility on this subject as he does on Architechture.

Royinsouthwest:
Are you upset because some American is grateful we don’t have a monarchy? You keep your system, and we are happy to keep ours. However, to clarify some points of history for you:
You wrote:
“Slavery was abolished throughout the British Empire long before it was abolished in the United States.”
Some might argue that Empire alone constitutes slavery, but leaving that aside, the British slave trade was abolished in 1807, but the practice of slavery continued throughout the Empire until abolished (1833) only 30 years before the Emancipation Proclamation in the United States and 32 years before the 13th Amendment to our Constitution. However, in some of the far-flung reaches of the Empire and later the Commonwealth, illict slavery continued long after Appomatox. Those with Irish ancestory might also point out that British rule was less enlightened and less altruistic than you suggest. Also remember that the American colonies were British until independence, and that slavery was a part of British America from its founding. Another way of looking at it, British slavery in North America (1607-1776) exceeded American slavery (1776-1865) and the early years of the American republic were literally consumed with the legacy of slavery established by the British.
You also wrote:
“The most democratic of the three countries in North America is a monarchy (for the present, at least)! ”
Since Canadians cannot vote for their head of state like Americans or Mexicans, that dog don’t hunt as we say down here. Personally, I don’t see Canada being any more or less democratic than the United States, and I think we have a great common tradition. By the way, there are 23 countries in North America.
Also:
“It [Canada] never had a civil war, but it did enter both world wars at the beginning instead of waiting like the United States to be attacked first.”
As you now understand, the American Civil War was partially a consequence of nearly two-hundred years of British policy (I’m not blaming it on Britain, just noting the facts). Furthermore, Britain’s policy during the Civil War was support and de facto recognition to the slave-holding South. The United States did not enter WWI (a war for European hegemony) at the beginning because we were not bound by treaty as was Great Britain, nor imperial obligations as Canada. But American entry undoubtedly hastened the end of the war. WWII, a subject I write professionally about, was also a war of distant hegemony, and the European war may not have occurred had Great Britain and the other victors followed American counsel at Versailles. I guess that you are unaware of Lend-Lease, the arsenal of democracy and the bending of our Neutrality Act, and that without declaration of war, the United States was actively engaged in WWII prior to being attacked – as the United States Navy was escorting British and Canadian convoys from Halifax prior to Pearl Harbor.
I’ve always believed in the strengths and virtues of the shared democratic traditions of the English-speaking world. It would have been interesting to see how history would have unfolded had Franklin Roosevelt taken Winston Churchill up on his post-Pearl Harbor suggestion of shared citizenship between the US and the UK – the main sticking point, of course, for us Americans being democratic objections to Empire and monarchy.
REPLY: let’s not let this thread turn into a discussion of slavery, further comments on the topic will be snipped – Anthony