by Bryan Walsh
September 10, 2022
Introduction:
Read more here: https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/202 ... d-kingdom(Vox) On Thursday afternoon, at Balmoral Castle in Scotland, Queen Elizabeth II died at 96. She occupied the British throne for 70 years, making her the UK’s longest-reigning monarch.
“Occupied” is perhaps the key word here. While the queen’s official powers were greater than many might think in a constitutional monarchy — according to the letter of the English law, the monarch can choose to appoint or dismiss the prime minister, for instance — in practice they were never exercised to their fullest extent, nor would they have ever been.
The queen’s position, if not the continued existence of the British monarchy, was dependent on remaining outside the actual political sphere. The British government of the day ruled in her name from Westminster, but it is considered unconstitutional for the monarch to even vote.
As a result, Elizabeth spent seven decades in one of the world’s most high-profile positions… without taking direct political action. She met everyone worth meeting, traveled over a million miles and visited over 115 countries, welcomed 15 British prime ministers to office — all without doing anything other than being her often silent royal self. That made her, in a sense, history’s greatest spectator.
And the history she witnessed was more than just the cumulative weight of 70 years. During those decades the world changed as it never has before — sometimes for the worse, often for the better — and Queen Elizabeth II observed it all from a singular perch.