I
to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the 2nd.
With the death of Queen Elizabeth and the coming
coronation of King Charles the Third,
people in Canada are asking,
why do we pledge allegiance to the King to begin with?
This is
♪ [light]
OK, first the story answer.
We pledge allegiance to King Charles because
Canada is what's called a constitutional monarchy.
So, what is that?
Well, the constitutional monarchy is our system
of government where we have a head of state who's above
party politics and is separate from the head
of government, who is the Prime Minister.
So the head of state is the monarch.
And the monarch right now is King Charles.
Why, might you ask, is King Charles from England
Canada's head of state?
At one point in history, the British Empire
was 1/4 of the world's lands.
That meant there were British colonies all over
the world and the King or Queen reigns over them.
Now colonialism is its own complex topic,
and we'll need another
to really dig into it.
Back to Canada, the colony,
we're not a colony anymore,
so why is the King still our head of state?
There's been no a long transition for Canada
from being part of this British Empire
to being part of a Commonwealth.
OK, Doctor Harris, let's pause right there.
The Commonwealth?
Well, the Commonwealth consists of countries that
mostly once belonged to the British Empire
and are now independent countries.
15 of these countries are Commonwealth realms where
the monarch is head of state, so these are fully
independent countries.
So King Charles is the head of state in these realms,
but they run their own governments and make
their own political decisions.
Got it?
But not every former colony wants the monarch
to be their head of state, and some have walked away.
One of the earliest examples is Ireland.
They gained their independence in 1921
after 700 years of British rule.
The most recent example is Barbados.
Though already an independent country,
their government voted to stop pledging allegiance
to the queen, part ways with the monarchy,
and become a Republic.
Why?
Well, each country has its own reasons.
But for Barbados...
The colonization that happened there was quite brutal.
Not many people know this, but actually in the
Caribbean they used to work slaves to death, actually,
so they didn't actually replace them.
And Jillian says that part of the reason for Barbados
to remove the monarchy as their head of state was to...
Try to recognize the history and become
its own country.
That kind of steps away from that brutal legacy.
And what happens after they remove the monarchy
as their head of state?
In Barbados case, they replaced the Queen
with a president.
So what do Canadians want?
According to a poll done by Angus Reed,
the majority of Canadians no longer want to be
a constitutional monarchy.
AKA, ditch the king as head of state.
The same poll found that the majority of Canadians
find the royal family less relevant than they used to be.
[yawns]
One of the challenges is that in Canada, a lot of
people don't think about the monarchy unless
there's a big royal tour or a big
royal event happening.
Ainara:
Colonialism has left a bitter taste for some
Canadians as well.
Indigenous peoples in particular have a complex
relationship with the crown.
Clearly the relationship between the Canada
and the Crown and Indigenous peoples isn't working.
It isn't a true nation to nation agreement
where everyone is mutually beneficial.
So I think we have to think about when we're
talking about abolishing the constitutional monarchy,
really center Indigenous voices.
Ainara:
as a head of state.
I think that the historical ties are of interest
to many Canadians.
There's been personal admiration for Queen Elizabeth
the 2nd and there's the involvement of members
of the Royal family as honorary colonels
and Chief of Canadian military regiments,
or as patrons of Canadian Charities.
But what if we did want to cut ties with the Royals?
So, in Canada, it would be a very complicated
process and would require all 10 provinces to agree.
The future is unwritten and there are a lot
of unanswered questions.
Class: I pledge allegiance to the flag.
Maybe we would be pledging allegiance to a flag
instead of the King, like in the US.
Would we still have a Governor General?
If not, who would be in charge of our military?
What happened to all the treaties that were signed
before Canada had a government?
Will the Royals still come to visit?
[sighs, swoosh]
But for now, we're going to keep doing what
we are currently doing, and this guy will probably
be on all of our money pretty soon.
Want to know who we spoke to
and where we got all of our research?
We listed our key sources right here.
That's it for
For
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