Wednesday, September 7, 2016

World War II and the Scandinavian Monarchies

From the Mad Monarchist:
In 1907, when he came to the throne, King Gustav V had extensive legal authority in political matters. However, in the reign of his father, parliament had more strongly asserted itself and, originally, King Gustav V went along with this new way of doing things. This changed with the coming of World War I. The King favored increasing Swedish military strength while the recently elected Liberal government did not. When a crowd of concerned citizens demonstrated in front of the palace in favor of strengthening the Swedish military in case the country were to become engulfed in the upcoming conflict, the King acted on his own to address the crowd, whose views were in accord with his own, to assure them that this would be done. The Liberal prime minister objected to this, King Gustav V responded that he was well within his rights to speak to his subjects on such a matter, as both their sovereign and commander-in-chief of the armed forces, which prompted the government to resign at which time the King appointed a more conservative administration to replace them. (Read more.)
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