Colin Kidd (2014), in reviewing two books on the impeachment and trial of Henry Sacheverell in 1710, traces the emergence of the foundations of the modern British state, in which the Crown in Parliament is sovereign, to the Glorious Revolution of 1688 and the decades that followed. He notes that,
"Ironically, the foundational moment of an enduring British state was greeted not with quiet assurance that comes from universal acclamation, but with the din of disputed narratives." (Kidd, 2014: 19)Interestingly, amid the clamour of current disputatious narratives, in seeking to undo the Union of Parliaments, the Scottish referendum to be held on 18 September 2014 is not a vote about also undoing the Union of the Crowns. As Kidd (2013) points out in the Stenton Lecture,
"The independence white paper Scotland’s Future issued by Scotland’s SNP Government in November 2013 announced that an independent Scotland would ‘remain within the Union of the Crowns’ – or ‘social union’ - and that the Queen’s position as head of state would ‘form an intrinsic part of the constitutional platform in place for independence’."The relationship between Scottish nationalism and Scottish republicanism, as Kidd (2013) goes on to discuss, is far less straightforward than the close and intimate relationship that exists between Irish nationalism and the cause of republicanism.
References
Kidd, C. (2013). From Jacobitism to the SNP: the Crown, the Union and the Scottish Question. The Stenton Lecture 2013 [online]. Available from: http://www.reading.ac.uk/web/files/history/from_jacobitism_to_the_snp.pdf [Accessed on 8 September 2014]
Kidd, C. (2014). Break their teeth, O God. London Review of Books, 36 (16), pp.19-20.
