King Charles III subtly reminds Congress about the importance of checks on kingly power

Almost 250 years after the American Revolution, it took a visiting British monarch to remind Congress what the rebellion stood for.

On his first state visit as king, Charles III didn’t pull any punches, although his Tuesday speech to a joint session of Congress was delivered in soothing British tones with gentle humor and dry understatement. Yet, he pointedly extolled the importance of historic alliances, the rule of law, Enlightenment values — and the need for checks and balances against overweening executive power.

Of course, these are all topics that have been dissed or dismissed by a U.S. president who believes in unchecked rule.

The monarch’s rapt audience kept jumping up and cheering, including most GOP legislators. It was as if they had been liberated by a genuine king from their fear of expressing their true feelings lest they offend a wannabe king.

Charles was nudging members of Congress to embrace the values that turned the Founding Fathers into “bold and imaginative rebels” against an arbitrary ruler in 1776. He was promoting the unique U.S.-British alliance by asking Congress to recall how American rebels built on a shared British history that had gradually limited the powers of the king.

Of course, President Donald Trump has slammed British Prime Minister Keir Starmer for his (understandable) reluctance to join a misconceived U.S. war against Iran. But the king’s references were a reminder that the relationship between the two countries is far deeper and more important than a presidential fit of pique.

As Charles pointed out, the American rebels balanced many contending forces and drew “strength in diversity,” a theme he repeatedly stressed.

Moreover, he said, the rebels “carried with them, and carried forward, the great inheritance of the British Enlightenment — as well as the ideals [of] English Common Law and Magna Carta.”

For those who have forgotten their European history, the 18th-century British Enlightenment championed reason, empirical science, tolerance, and civic virtue among other values. Not exactly in vogue in MAGA politics, but these values are the basis for Thomas Jefferson’s “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

As for the Magna Carta, for the first time, in 1215, it addressed grievances of British nobles and regulated royal abuses of power, such as unfair taxation. This was the first step toward limiting the power of the monarchy.

King Charles mentioned “no taxation without representation,” a subtle reminder that tariffs are taxes on Americans that have never been legalized by Congress — and that Trump is always threatening more such tariffs when he’s peeved at Britain or Europe.

The U.S. Supreme Court has finally put a limit on Trump’s use of executive power to impose tariffs. But the president is still trying to find a workaround to tariff-tax Americans without congressional approval — as GOP legislators refuse to challenge his usurpation of authority. They are throwing away the rights the Founding Fathers, and the British, fought to obtain.

I have stood frozen with awe while viewing an original copy of the Magna Carta in the British Library in London (only four originals still exist). For me, the thrill was equal to viewing an original Declaration of Independence in Philadelphia’s Museum of the American Revolution, because the two are linked over a millennium.

As Charles pointed out, “Magna Carta is cited in at least 160 Supreme Court cases since 1789, not least as the foundation of the principle that executive power is subject to checks and balances” [italics mine]. This is the reason why there stands a stone by the River Thames at Runnymede where Magna Carta was signed.”

A subtle reminder, perhaps, that a stone memorial to government by and for the people, with its limits on centralized power, might better suit our shared values than a golden arch.

The king drew massive applause when he stressed that the alliance between the U.S. and Britain, and the Atlantic partnership between Europe and America, “is more important today than it has ever been.” Even Vice President JD Vance and Speaker Mike Johnson were enraptured. Were they hypnotized by the monarch’s decency and common sense?

Charles drew the sting out of Trump’s petty insults and lies with his nod to Starmer (despite Trump’s disdain), his warm praise for the British navy (which Trump has slurred), and his reminder of how NATO stood beside America after 9/11 (which Trump never mentions).

“That same unyielding resolve is needed for the defense of Ukraine and her most courageous people — in order to secure a truly just and lasting peace,” Charles stated firmly.

While he received lengthy applause from both sides of the aisle, the Pentagon continues to hold up modest Ukraine funds that Congress passed months ago, and is shortchanging Europe on critical weapons it wants to purchase to send to Kyiv. And Trump wants to invite war criminal Vladimir Putin to a G20 summit in Miami in December, rewarding him for a massive bombardment of Ukrainian civilians and for helping Iran with intelligence and weaponry in the current war.

So, again, it was bewildering to watch the fervor with which Republicans applauded the British monarch. How can Republicans cheer for Ukraine when the GOP’s leader is helping the Russian aggressor?

GOP legislators applauded even when the king called on Congress to “reflect on our shared responsibility to safeguard nature,” and to address “the collapse of critical natural systems.” This was a not-too-subtle plea for attention to climate change, the very mention of which is anathema to the White House.

The British visitor never mentioned Trump. He was never overtly political, never nasty, never hectoring or trying to overtly interfere in U.S. politics. And yet, his message could not have been clearer.