The Evolving Canadian Crown.

• Author: Robert, Charles
• Position: Book review

The Evolving Canadian Crown edited by Jennifer Smith and D. Michael Jackson (McGill--Queen's University Press, Montreal, 2012) 248 pages.

In this year of the Diamond Jubilee, Queen Elizabeth II, who succeeded to the throne at the young age of 25 in 1952 following the premature death of her father, King George VI, is celebrating sixty years on the throne. The Queen's reign has been by most measures a great success. Despite the tremendous changes which have occurred in the United Kingdom, Canada and the Commonwealth over the last sixty years, the Queen and "The Firm" (the other members of the Royal Family) have, with only a few notable false steps, demonstrated a remarkable capacity to adapt to ever-changing circumstances and expectations.

From the accounts thus far, it seems that the Queen will enjoy a joyous year of celebration in the United Kingdom where her subjects seem ready to manifest their warm appreciation and affection to a Sovereign who has fulfilled her commitment of devoting her life to service which has been discharged with dignity and grace. Given her age and that too of Prince Philip, the Queen will limit her heavy schedule to activities this year within the United Kingdom. Other members of the Firm have been assigned the task of traveling to different member states of the Commonwealth. The Prince of Wales and The Duchess of Cornwall are coming to Canada in May.

The Diamond Jubilee and the visit to Canada of the Queen's heir will doubtless prompt speculation about the future of the monarchy in Canada. Perhaps in anticipation of this, Senators Joyal and Segal chaired a conference of like-minded monarchists in June 2010 on Parliament Hill to examine the role and prospects of the Crown in Canada. The end result is the publication of the presented papers, The Evolving Canadian Crown. The book contains fourteen essays plus an introduction by Professor Jennifer Smith. These essays are grouped into four themes relating specifically to Canada with another touching the situation in Australia and New Zealand.

The themes themselves are illustrative of the challenges that the Crown in Canada is facing. For example, under the first theme, the Crown in Canadian perspective, there are two papers. The first, written by D. Michael Jackson and Lynda Haverstock, deals with the confusing concept of the compound Crown that has the Queen recognized separately as the Queen "in right of" each province as well as the country as a whole. Much of the...