The Queen's Wishes

Currycombed as sleek as seals, Britain's famed Windsor greys last week were harnessed once again to the Irish state coach to carry their mistress to Westminster for the opening of Parliament. In an age of internal combustion engines, the greys were as much of an anachronism as the three gleaming detachments of the Household Cavalry which escorted the Queen's coach, but all played their parts in the elaborate ceremonial of royal rule with the dignity and solemnity that Britons expect of the occasion.

This year, for the first time at an opening of Parliament, Elizabeth wore the Imperial State Crown laden with 3,095 jewels,* as she read the speech written for her by Winston Churchill's ministers. A House of Lords gallery packed with such alert first-nighters as Noel Coward agreed that she did her bit with only the faintest touch of nervousness.

Sir Winston himself was not around to hear the Queen speak his words. He was home in bed working on a speech of his own, a far more orotund affair (see INTERNATIONAL) than the brief, ten-minute address he had given his sovereign. Both speeches reflected the same Churchillian hope: to keep the Tory government in command for its full term. "We were elected [in 1951] for a five-year period under what is called the Quinquennial Act," Churchill told the House of Commons that afternoon, rolling his tongue happily over the long, Latinate word. As outlined by the Queen, the government plans for the next year gave no indication that Churchill was contemplating drastic changes that might call for a general election. The boldest suggestions were 1) to ease rent controls in private housing, particularly where landlords were saddled with run-down properties needing urgent repairs: 2) to end farm-produce rationing completely by next year.

A surprise provision in the Queen's speech urged further reform (i.e., restriction) of the House of Lords, a project which has preoccupied Churchill ever since 1910, when as a member of the Liberal government he spent his workdays castigating dukes and his weekends enjoying the hospitality of his cousin, the Duke of Marlborough./-

Later in the week the Queen sent to Parliament a message that was closer to her heart. It was a change in the Regency Act to make her husband, Philip, regent (in place of her sister, Margaret), in case the Queen should die before her son, Prince Charles, reaches maturity (18 for a British ruler). Some backbenchers grumbled at making a regent of someone who is not in the immediate line of succession, but her proposal is "agreed legislation," meaning that it has been approved by the major parties beforehand.

* It is so heavy (3 lbs. 3 oz.) that it used to give headaches to her grandfather, George V.

/- He is still proud of the phrase he coined then: "End 'em, not referndum."

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