In
light of the acute embarrassment that David Trimble's
membership in The Orange Order has caused Ronald
Lauder and other potential donors to the Ulster
Unionist Party, it must be made clear that it is
ENGLISH LAW ITSELF that is the root cause of the
Orange Order's historic anti-Catholic bigotry. It
is the Queen's very own law — the Act of Settlement
of 1701 — which STILL TODAY governs who can
become the English Monarch.
"We
cannot in fairness just blame the Orange Order when
the foundational English law, The Act of Settlement
1701 — the law that provides the moral and
political justification for all Orange anti-Catholic
bigotry in Northern Ireland — is still the
law of the land today," explained Father Sean
Mc Manus, President of the Capitol Hill-based Irish
National Caucus.
"That
law forbids a Catholic from being the Monarch and
if the Monarch marries a Catholic or converts to
Catholicism, the people are 'absolved of their allegiance'*."
"So
how can we blame the Orange Order if we do not first
demand that the Queen of England and the British
Government lead the way in rejecting this inherently
anti-Catholic law? It would be like having an American
law which states that no black person can be President
of the United States."
"Yet
when British Prime Minister Tony Blair was urged
to change this archaic (but in Northern Ireland
fully resonant) law, he said it would take too much
time and paper work."
"The
buck stops with the British Establishment. This
stupid Law has deadly and pernicious effect in Northern
Ireland. While the average Englishman couldn't care
less about this ridiculous Law, in Northern Ireland
it provides deadly ammunition to anti-Catholic bigots.
But the British Establishment — Church and
State — cannot run and hide from this Law.
They must repeal it."
* "... And it was thereby further enacted,
that all and every person and persons that then
were, or afterwards should be reconciled to, or
shall hold communion with the see or Church of Rome,
or should profess the popish religion, or marry
a papist, should be excluded, and are by that Act
made for ever incapable to inherit, possess, or
enjoy the Crown and government of this realm, and
Ireland, and the dominions thereunto belonging,
or any part of the same, or to have, use, or exercise
any regal power, authority, or jurisdiction within
the same: and in all and every such case and cases
the people of these realms shall be and are thereby
absolved of their allegiance..." (Act of
Settlement 1701, still in force today.)
