Monarchical USA?

No.

Oh yeah . . . and then, in no time at all, we could look forward to our very own Prince Charlie . . . a horse-faced congenital idiot . . .

There are a lot of really screwy things about the American political system that could be fixed but adding a monarch is of little use to any political system as far as I can see.

In some ways, the US already has a "monarch".

For the sake of my country, I would humbly accept the crown.

We already tried King George.

By we u mean the English colonists who didnt want to pay for the war they wanted?

Quite possibly yes, although it's a matter of personal taste.

We have a precedent for what the USA might look like today if it had kept its monarchy. It's called Canada. How does Canada compare to the USA today? To a first approximation, there isn't all that much of a difference. To a second approximation, and to add some historical perspective, let's remember that Canada ...

• abolished slavery and gave Blacks equal rights long before the US did,
  
• gave women the vote at almost the same time as the US and introduced universal healthcare long before the US.
  
• introduced universal healthcare generations ago, and
  
• has legalized gay marriage nationwide.
  

With all this in mind, I think the USA is probably worse off for having abolished the monarchy. Those 1773 tea partiers should have just paid their bloody taxes and shut up -- exactly as their imitators should today.

I thank u for my similar point of view. And lets be reasonable, do we pay taxes today? Isnt tht what the Colonists rebelled against?

No, it's not.

Then what did they rebell against with the slogans "No taxation without Representation"?

The lack of representation.

In 1758, while what we call the French and Indian War raged, Thomas Pownall, newly appointed governor of Massachusetts, sent a letter to the Lords of Trade, who were at that time responsible for the colonies. He told them that prior to the war, Massachusetts had had an annual budget on the order of 45,000 pounds sterling. Now, one in seven men in Massachusetts were serving the King by land or by sea, and the colony had amassed a debt in excess of 330,000 pounds. He then explained that the legislature had come up with a plan to sink the debt in three years, using a combination of local excise and property taxes--and the people accepted it willingly, because their elected representatives had passed the plan. The lesson was lost on those in power in London, though.

Pitt was gone as prime minister, and the new King, George III, was looking to find work for his cronies, while the Parliament, which had spent enormous sums to prop up King Frederick of Prussia, was looking for ways to pay for that war, without raising the excise or property taxes, because, after all, merchants and the landed gentry were the only people represented in Parliament, and they certainly did not intend to tax their own masters who had sent them to Westminster. So Parliament tried to get it out of the Americans, ignoring how much they had contributed, and claiming (falsely) that the Americans hid behind the shield of Empire, but were unwilling to pay for it. (The Americans had largely defended themselves from 1630 onwards, and the English had only showed up in force after 1755, when they wanted to take the French lands away from them, and drive the French from North America--it was never about defending the Americans.)

Americans complained that they weren't represented in Parliament. Lord North's government responded that they were virtually represented. Nobody on this side of the Atlantic was buying that bullshit.

I can c that u purposely went to Wikipedia to get some facts for this argument. Ok, so what if the Parliment didn't want their suporters to pay. So what if the English Army arrived in the Americas later on (thought I do not believe England didnt suport its colonies in times of war). Even if what you say is true, I do not believe that taxes can be a logical explination to rebelling against a King. Every country has periods of time when they neeed money. And the last time I checked, colonies were arranged to get a PROFIT! So if the colonies said that the King used them as a purse, maybe they should have first thought before going there because that is wat u get in a colony:Land and Taxes

No, i did not "go to Wikipedia" for my argument. It may surprise you to learn this, but people have for most of time gotten educated in literate societies by reading books. I first read history at university, when the internet did not exist, and when personal computers did not exist. Although i don't recall the exact source for Pownall's letter the Lords of Trade, i suspect that it can be found in the seventh and final volume of Francis Parkman's history of the French in North America, which is entitled: Montcalm and Wolfe, the French and Indian War. I really don't care what you believe about the English defending the colonies, because what you believe is not evidence from the historical record. Read Parkman some time--all seven volumes. It's not that hard, and he writes well. You might learn something worth knowing--which is usually more than can be said about going to Wikipedia.

In 1628, King Charles prorogued Parliament, and attempted to run England without a Parliament. That lasted about ten years, until he tried to invade Scotland got his military ass handed to him, at which point he was forced to call a Parliament because the tricks he attempted to use--principally levying ship money in inland counties--didn't work as people refused to pay his taxes (an old tradition in England by then, the refusal to pay taxes unless one's representatives had levied the tax). By 1640, after calling and dismissing one Parliament, and calling another with which he argued and lost, he went to war with Parliament.

Throughout that entire period, and throughout the subsequent civil wars in England, and throughout the Protectorate, the English colonists in North America were on their own. Both in Virginia and in Massachusetts, there were uprisings by the aboriginal populations, and the colonists had to find the means to defend themselves, and organize themselves to that purpose without the aid of England, sunk in the mire of civil war and regicide.

The m0narchy was not restored until 1660. Thereafter, the new King Charles II, obviated the quarrels with France by secretly taking subsidies from his cousin, King Louis XIV of France. There was not trouble again until after 1688. Charles died in 1685, was succeeded by his pigheaded brother James, and James was run out of England by the Protestants who feared he would attempt to return England to the Catholic Church. There followed three wars--the Nine Years War, the War of the Spanish Succession and the War of the Austrian Succession.

Each of these wars were played out in North America, too, because the principal enemy in each case was France, which had a colony to the north of what we call New England. In North America, they were known respectively as King William's War, Queen Anne's War and King George's War. In each of these three cases, the colonists had to rely on their own resources to protect them from the French and their aboriginal allies, largely the Migma of what is now New Brunswick. They had a powerful ally in the Iroquois Confederation, which hated the French with a burning passion. They got little to no help from the English, who kept derisory Royal Navy squadrons in North American waters largely to protect trade and to enforce the excise. Their interest at that time was in stealing as much as they could from the French in the West Indies, and the colonists of North America be damned. So the colonists organized their own defense, provided supplies to the Royal Navy and to the laughably small army detachments who never marched out against the French, and outfitted their own expeditions against the French. In King George's War, the colonists, without outside aid, mounted an expedition which took the great French fortress of Louisbourg which guarded the entrance to the estuary of the St. Laurent River. The English gave it back to the French during the peace negotiations.

But the nub of this is that you still don't understand what motivated the rebellion. The colonists didn't object to paying taxes, they objected to paying taxes levied by a legislature in which they weren't represented. They had been paying taxes to their own legislatures for 150 years, and usually for the good and sufficient reasons of maintaining ports and roads, and paying for arms and gunpowder to defend themselves against the French and their aboriginal allies.

Mercantilism was a dismal failure. That was the theory that you set up colonies, and then bleed them white by taxation and import and export duties, as a part of an imperial administration. All of England's colonies were a dead loss to the government, and only benefited private individuals who invested in them, and then expected the government to provide a shield behind which they would operate. The North American experience was more egregious because they had no powerful friends in Parliament as did the sugar planters of the West Indies, and the merchants who traded into India. Which is why there was a rebellion, even if your view is too simple-minded for you to understand it.

So what u r saying is tht I am uneducated? Fine, I will not lower myself to ur level to reply with an insult. And even though I don't agree with u, I still respect ur beliefs while u on the other hand just plain snap at everything U think isn't right by ur knowledge. The English colonies were always a commerce source, weather it was for Government or investors. What I am ttrying to say is that the colonies just rebelled cause they felt used by the Parliment. Ok so they rebel. But a mistake of one monarch does not mean a mistke of all forthcoming monarchs. If USA had chosen to be a Constitutional Monarchy even after the Revolution, we wouldn't have to wait for 2 years for 1 law to be passed. I can already predict tht u will answer me with saying something about a mad monarch coming to power and my answer is: Constitution. It must be written reasonably so as to prevent such a thing from happenning. However once crowned, a King cannot be uncrowned. So that is why the Congress should have spent a little bit more time writting down their laws and making USA a Constitutional Monarchy. At least that would be an advantage of USA because one monarch can earn the respect of other monarchs. That is the reason why it took USA some time to earn respect from other countries: Their new government was unpopular at the time.

Enough said?

And who would you suggest be crowned King (or Queen?) of the USA? I think Dick Cheney would volunteer, but only if you throw in a fully equipped dungeon and a treasure room for all the loot he would collect.

Ignorance is not insulting, failing to repair one's ignorance is an insult you offer yourself. You were pleased to suggest that i engage in historical synthesis by going to Wikipedia, and now you want to whine because i am easily able to demonstrate that you don't know what you are talking about. In my experience, opinions are invincible in inverse proportion to the knowledge that supports them.

The colonists didn't rebel against the monarch to the extent that George III, as was the case with all monarchs after Charles I was beheaded in January, 1649, was not the governing power in England. The colonists were rebelling against Parliament because Parliament was taxing them while they were not represented in Parliament. It's a simple equation, expressed by a catch phrase in use since the revolution, no taxation without representation. It is hardly any fault of mine that you don't understand the force of that argument.

You are completely wrong about what argument i would advance against a constitutional monarchy. A constitutional monarchy is proof against a "mad monarch" because monarchs in a constitutional monarchy are powerless figureheads. As for your maundering about monarchs and respect, you just further demonstrate your ignorance. If you find it insulting to be told that, then there is a remedy at hand. Educate yourself.

Kings cannot be uncrowned, certainly, but they can be disposed of, and often have been. William Rufus, son of William the Conqueror, was murdered. Steven of Blois was twice captured, and replaced by Maud the Empress, and finally agreed that Maud's son Henry would succeed him. Edward II was murdered. Richard II had his throne usurped by Henry Bolingbroke, and was then murdered, with Henry taking the throne as Henry IV. His grandson, Henry VI, was twice captured and replaced by his cousin Edward IV, and he was eventually murdered. Edward's sons, Edward V and the Duke of York were murdered. Edward's brother, Richard III, was defeated by Henry, Earl of Richmond, in battle, and was killed on the battlefield. Parliament finally got the upper hand when they captured Charles I, imprisoned him, tried him and executed him. His son, James II, was driven out of England, and replaced on the throne by his son-in-law and daughter, William and Mary. No English monarch ever again exercised any real power.

Once again, pointing out that you are ignorant is not an insult. Once again, you insult yourself if you don't remedy your ignorance.

I am clearly not whining. I have enough knowledge to understand what Government would suite what country. I mearly ask to keep this political and not personal. And yes u r right about one thing: England's Monarchs never really exercised a full power over their dominion. That is why even if writting a Constitution for a new government, if u want a Monarch, u must forsee that the laws u write down give a king (or queen) as much authority as possible. Yet I still believe that USA would have been better off with a monarch, HOWEVER, the way this country (or almost any country for that matter) is built, a Monarchy is almost a completely instinct government. But I truly hope it restores again soon. And Setanta, if u took the Wikipedia joke seriously, u should really learn hhow to live with humor in life, ok?