The Historical Inquiry: Are You the King of Scots, Your Majesty?
8/19/20254 min read
Letter to Charles III of England
The Secretary
The 1820 Society
Glasgow
Scotland
10th August 2025
His Majesty the King
Buckingham Palace
London
SW1A 1AA
England
Your Majesty,
As an historical society, we are writing to ask about your legal status. Briefly, our question is: Are you, in fact, the King of Scots?
To expand upon our question: Are you the King of Scots in respect of having taken the full Scottish Oath, with that Oath being fully performed and recognised by the people of Scotland and recognised with respect to international law and registered with the relevant international bodies, thus adhering to the 1320 Declaration of Arbroath, the 1328 Treaty of Edinburgh-Northampton, and the 1689 Claim of Right?
As Your Majesty will be aware, the Scottish Crown is a distinct legal and constitutional entity that predates the 1707 Treaty of Union. The sovereignty of Scotland lies not in the Crown (monarch) itself but in the people, as clearly stated in the Declaration of Arbroath (1320) the Treaty of Edinburgh-Northampton (1328) and reaffirmed in the Claim of Right (1689), and subsequent state practice.
For Clarity: The Treaty of Edinburgh-Northampton was an agreement signed in 1328 between the Kingdom of Scotland and the Kingdom of England. In that Treaty, England formally recognised Scotland as a fully independent kingdom with Robert the Bruce as its rightful king. The Treaty was negotiated after years of warfare, including Robert the Bruce’s victory at the Battle of Bannockburn in 1314, which had greatly strengthened Scotland’s position.
That Treaty declared that Scotland would be free from any claims of overlordship by England, and it stated that the two kingdoms were to remain separate and sovereign in their own right. The document was sealed in Edinburgh on 17 March 1328 and ratified in Northampton on 3 May 1328.
It included a marriage alliance between Robert the Bruce’s son, David II of Scotland, and Joan of the Tower, the sister of Edward III of England, to help secure peace between the nations. In international legal and historical terms, it remains a clear recognition by England of Scotland’s independent statehood and sovereignty.
Those foundational acts established beyond doubt that no individual may claim the Scottish Crown (monarchy) without the express invitation and consent of the sovereign Scottish people. The Scottish monarchy cannot be inherited or assumed automatically by descent, or by virtue of the so-called “British” throne, but only through lawful constitutional process, recognition, and distinct ceremony as required by the customs of Scotland’s ancient and continuing constitutional order.
There is no British throne, only an English throne with a borrowed Scottish crown.
It is a matter of public record that there has been no separate Scottish Coronation for Your Majesty. No crown of Scotland has been received. No direct and exclusive oath has been sworn before the people of Scotland in their sovereign capacity. There has been no distinct act by which Your Majesty has submitted to the Claim of Right or acknowledged the Scottish people as the ultimate authority under Scots constitutional law. Without those fundamental acts, Your Majesty’s claim to be King of Scots remains constitutionally un-established and open to challenge.
We therefore respectfully request that Your Majesty publicly and unequivocally confirm or deny whether you claim to be King of Scots in accordance with the constitutional laws of Scotland, independent of any claim under the authority of the United Kingdom. If you do claim that title, we respectfully request an explanation of the basis upon which that claim rests, including confirmation of the date, location, and constitutional basis of any ceremony, oath, or recognition issued specifically by or to the sovereign people of Scotland.
This matter cannot remain unresolved.
The Union of the Crowns in 1603 under James VI and I was a personal union, arising from Queen Elizabeth (1533-1603) having no children and being succeeded by James, King of Scots, who was the great-great-grandson of English King Henry VII, not a merging of thrones. After 1707, the government at Westminster treated the monarchy as one entity under a single parliament, but the Scottish Crown remains distinct – it was never legally extinguished, only administered through the Union framework.
According to the historical and parliamentary records available, Queen Anne was crowned in London on 23 April,1702, at Westminster Abbey. She did not at any time thereafter travel to Scotland for a separate coronation or to take the Scottish Coronation Oath in person. However, her accession to the Scottish throne was accepted by proclamation, and her required Oath obligations were fulfilled through written declarations read by her Lord High Commissioner, James Douglas, 2nd Duke of Queensberry, at the opening of the Scottish Parliament in May 1703. There is no record of any physical oath ceremony performed by Queen Anne on Scottish soil. This is confirmed by primary sources such as the Acts of the Parliament of Scotland, the Register of the Parliament, and by respected historians including Paul Henderson Scott and T.C. Smout. The dates, names, and legal references provided are accurate to the best of current historical knowledge and recorded archival material.
In the absence of lawful foundation, any claim to the Scottish Crown by the monarch of England would represent a continuing act of constitutional imposition. The people of Scotland, as the original and sole source of sovereignty, retain the right to seek redress, to assert their national status, and to demand the restoration of their rightful constitutional institutions in accordance with international law and the right to self-determination as enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations.
We do not know how often Queen Anne may have been in Scotland after May 1703, but we are aware that you have long been a frequent visitor, and so we wonder about your legal and constitutional status.
We therefore submit this constitutional question not only to you but to the international community, to those bodies whose purpose it is to uphold justice, self-determination, and lawful sovereignty among all nations and peoples. We assert that Scotland was never extinguished as a nation. Her Crown was never lawfully merged, nor were her people dissolved. Her people were never asked nor consulted, and did not consent to their absorption into a structure that has denied them their national, legal, and democratic integrity.
We request a formal response from Your Majesty and from each institution and representative addressed herein, to clarify the position of all parties regarding the sovereignty of Scotland and the legitimacy of the current constitutional arrangements.
Respectfully,
The Secretary
The 1820 Society
10th August 2025
cc: all Permanent Missions to the United Nations
other relevant organisations and individuals