March 04, 2024

David Charter on Queen Elizabeth, Her Relationship with the United States, and the 13 Presidents She Knew While on the Throne—From Eisenhower to Biden

51 minutes

Today’s conversation, if nothing else, was made just for me—and I hope many of you, as well. Two of my favorite subjects to read about are the British royal family and U.S. presidents, and those two subject matters meet today thanks to David Charter, author of Royal Audience: 70 Years, 13 Presidents, One Queen’s Special Relationship with America, out March 5. In the book David zooms in on one facet of the Special Relationship between the U.K. and the U.S.—the relationship of the late Queen Elizabeth with the 13 U.S. presidents she knew in her record-breaking 70 year reign on the British throne, from 1952 to her death in 2022. This book traces the Queen’s relationship with each president from Eisenhower to Biden—and she was especially close to four presidents during that time period. Do you think you can guess who? You’ll have to listen to the episode to find out. Her late Majesty loved the U.S.; on a visit in 1957, for example, she requested to go to a football game and a supermarket in Maryland—and she did just that. Any viewer of The Crown knows the less-than-great exchange between First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy and the Queen, who were roughly the same age; today on the show we unpack that interesting encounter between two of the most famous women in the world. Around the Reagan presidency, the Queen developed such a love affair with the U.S. that, in addition to state visits, she took five private visits to the U.S., mostly centered around horseracing. I was so touched by this anecdote: after the September 11, 2001, attacks on the U.S., the Queen sang “The Star-Spangled Banner,” the first time she had ever sung a national anthem for a foreign country, and the first time she had sung a national anthem, period, as she didn’t sing “God Save the Queen” to herself. This moment is but one example of her class and dignity, in my opinion. Her last state visit to the U.S. was during the George W. Bush administration, in May 2007. From then on out, U.S. presidents came to her. Today on the show David and I talk about subjects like royal protocol and U.S. presidents and how, all told, the Queen visited 15 U.S. states and Washington, D.C.; I love this quote David has in here from The Washington Post from 1991: “Two centuries after George III lost the colonies, Queen Elizabeth is in danger of winning them back.” She was very difficult not to love. I gobbled up this book and wanted more, and I can’t wait for you to hear from David. He became the U.S. editor of The Times in 2018 and is based, perhaps appropriately for this book, in Washington, D.C. Before that, he was the chief political correspondent, Brussels correspondent, and Berlin correspondent at The Times, and is now the assistant U.S. editor of the publication. Get ready for a fascinating conversation!

Royal Audience: 70 Years, 13 Presidents, One Queen’s Special Relationship with America by David Charter

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