Ending discrimination, one king at a time

The Wall Street Journal has an article by Aaron Patrick about the change in British succession:

The prohibition on British monarchs marrying Catholics, and the primacy of princes over princesses in regal succession, would become relics of history under an endorsement from Prime Minister Gordon Brown. Mr. Brown said he wants to change Britain's rules of succession, ending both the 321-year-old religious ban and the practice of primogeniture, in which the right of succession belongs to the eldest son.
England's 1688 Bill of Rights prohibits heirs to British throne from marrying "a papist", a rule designed to protect the power of the Church of England. It is one of the few remaining discriminatory laws in Britain from the bloody religious struggle between Catholics and Protestants that consumed the country throughout the 1500s and 1600s.
Primogeniture, meanwhile, is a long-established practice in many royal families. Changing the law would have limited immediate impact, leaving the three current heirs in place: Prince Charles, and his sons, Prince William and Prince Harry. Under the proposed changes, the Princess Royal, also known as Princess Anne, would move from tenth to fourth in succession order.
"I think in the 21st Century, people do expect discrimination to be removed," Mr. Brown, who was traveling in Brazil, said in an interview with the British Broadcasting Corp. Mr. Brown's office issued a statement saying the existing laws on royal succession "should change" and "we are keen to open a process of dialogue" to rewrite them. A government spokeswoman declined to discuss specific plans to change the laws. With support for his administration at low levels, Mr. Brown may have seized upon the issue to drive up his popularity.
A survey for the BBC by a polling company found that 81% of respondents agree that the monarch should be allowed to marry a Catholic. Catholics make up roughly 8% of the population, according to the Catholic Church. "It is anachronistic, it is discriminatory and is sure at some point to be repealed," said a spokesman for Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, the senior Catholic figure in the UK.
Changing the rules would be diplomatically complex. The British head of state, currently Queen Elizabeth II, is queen of fifteen other nations, including Canada, Australia, Jamaica, and Barbados, and all would have to agree on changes to the succession laws, according to Mr. Brown's office. Existing efforts to change the law in Parliament have stalled in part because of the complexity of getting those other countries to sign on. In countries with strong sentiment for breaking with the monarchy, such as Australia, the succession issue could prompt a broader discussion about the relevance of the British monarchy.
Mr. Brown has emphasized he doesn't wish to threaten the Church of England or the British monarchy, which remains highly popular, nor has he proposed allowing a Catholic to become monarch. A spokesman for the queen declined to comment.
The changes aren't imminent. A senior government official, Jack Straw, said during an appearance in Parliament that there is little chance the succession laws will be altered before Britain's next election, which is expected next year.
Last year, a Canadian, Autumn Kelly, renounced her Catholicism to marry Peter Phillips, the queen's grandson. In 1978, the queen's cousin, Prince Michael of Kent, was removed from the line of succession— a list of who will replace the queen— when he married Marie-Christine von Reibnitz, a Catholic.

Rico says that, for many years, it's been the thing he gives up for Lent: his claim to the British throne. (Via Jane Seymour, you see; and, no, not the actress, either.) It's nice that, as a Zen Buddhist, he'll now have a real crack at it...