First, the Council of State decisions are not legally binding in Spain. The Council of State is the “supreme advisory body of the government”, according to article 107 of the Constitution. Issues opinions on matters submitted to the government or its members for consultation, although they will not be binding, unless the law provides otherwise, or the Supreme Court makes a legal decision.
https://www.abc.es/espana/abci-consejo-estado-y-cuales-competencias-201511101204_noticia.html
Even so, the opinion of the Council of State also says that “exercising the office of Cronista de Armas de la Junta de Castilla y León is authorized by the Autonomous Decree 105/1991.”
Concerning the municipalities only argument, that’s incorrect. The decree 105/1991 contains many articles. And, the Council of State decision, which is not binding, did not address Articles 15, 16, and 17 of the 105/1991 decree of the Junta de Castilla y León.
If you read Article 16, it provides the Cronista the same powers as the Cronista Rey de Armas of yesterday contained in the Royal Decree of 1915 which states:
“In addition to the palatine function entrusted to them, they come from very old, issuing certifications in matters of nobility, genealogy and coats of arms, for having recognized them of this faculty ...” Notice that the term palatine had to do with governmental heraldry,.
Despite not addressing Article 16 specifically, the Council of State 1995 opinion includes the Decree’s verbiage from the Junta de Castilla y León as follows:
“The decree is headed with the name of the President of the Junta of Castilla y León, who addresses “Vos ......, Marquis de ......, neighbor of ......”; refers first to the Decree of appointment and continues: “And then, having accepted this appointment, I have resolved to issue the present decree so that from now on you can continue to be named and titled Cronista de Armas de Castilla y León, showing all the faculties and competences, honors and distinctions, of the former Cronista Reyes de Armas de of Castilla y León being able therefore to sign as such the reports and opinions that this Meeting of Castilla y León requests you in the matters of your competence, to issue the certifications of genealogy, nobility and coats of arms, letters of oficiales de armas, confirmations, grants of new arms and authorizations of use that were requested by individuals (which for validity must have the approval of this Board and will be saved and registered in your Minutes, which will be deposited every year in the Central Archive of the Administration of Castilla y León), use the traditional badges of this trade, and appoint you to subscribe with the title of Castilla-León “. Entrusts and sends to all Authorities, Corporations and individuals who receive and are Cronistas de Armas de Castilla y León, with their honors, pre-eminences and prerogatives, “without that for the perpetuity of this appointment is necessary another decree, mandate or cedula Given in Valladolid, on June 13, one thousand nine hundred and ninety-one.”
https://www.boe.es/buscar/doc.php?id=CE-D-1995-2437
Notice that although the non-binding Council of State opinion includes the decree from the Junta de Castilla y León, describing authority beyond municipal, it only states the authority as only being municipal, the opinion ignores the decree from the Junta de Castilla y León stating otherwise, why?
In addition, many changes have occurred since that time; Spain today has 17 autonomous regions, each with its own President and independent judicial.
The Constitution of Castilla y León was last revised in 2007 with total autonomy including judicial authority. The Decrees and official judicial decisions by the autonomous Junta de Castilla y León are legally binding, unlike the Council of State opinion which has no authority, and the Junta’s laws and judicial decisions trump the Council of State opinion.
https://www.boe.es/buscar/act.php?id=BOE-A-2007-20635”
Furthermore, the Council of State, in its Opinion 2047/2004, stated that Castilla y León had received, from the Ministry of Justice, autonomy corresponding to its functions of the Administration of Justice, which would include authority to appoint a Cronista de Armas, through the Organic Law 14/2007 (e.g., reforming the Statute of Autonomy for Castilla y León.)
More importantly, the Ministry of Justice abandoned making such decisions in 1994. If the Ministry wanted to continue that tradition, Don Alfonso qualifies with degrees in law and doctorate in history, required by the decree of 1951, which Don Vicente de Cadenas and Vicent lacked.
https://www.boe.es/datos/pdfs/BOE/1951/123/A02054-02054.pdf
The most convincing piece is the endorsement by the Royal House concerning new arms for newly granted titles of nobility. Here are the arms of the Conde de Latores co-signed by both SM Don Juan Carlos I and the Cronista de Armas de Castilla y León.
The entire argument against this appointment only relies on the Council of State 1995 non-binding opinion which is incomplete, did not address Article 16 of the Decree 105/1991 in particular, is outdated since the Ministry of Justice abandoned such decisions 10 years earlier in 1994, and superseded by the Autonomous Constitution of Castilla y León of 2007.
It is important to understand the history, the Constitution, decrees, and the Royal House endorsement, to get the full picture. I undertook this research after reading inaccuracies in the AHS Blog, not the AHS FB group. The findings speak for themselves. The evidence is overwhelming, the opposing opinion not so. Time to rely not only on fact, but on who has the authority.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1CRqUrl1vHkacoOi_pHTgIbF42oaZ9QJV/view?usp=drivesdk
]]>To get to the point, my wife and I are preparing a book on her Anglo-Irish Palmer ancestors and we want to include not only the arms of all her ancestors for twelve generations, but also the quartered arms of her Palmer ancestors (Palmer quartered with Smyth and Ralphson). However, her deceased English cousin, the legitimate heir of the Palmer arms, requested several years ago that we not post his arms on our website and we have complied. We did not post the full achievement of the Palmer arms and only show the individual component arms of the quarters (see http://mcguinnessfamily.org/palmer-arms.htm, also see http://mcguinnessfamily.org/palmer-armorial.htm).
What is the etiquette of using the quartered Palmer arms in our book? And more generally, what is the etiquette of reproducing ancestral arms online and in publications?
The book is not a profit making venture, we will explain that all these ancestral arms cannot be used as personal arms, and we will make it very clear that, as they descend from an illegitimate son of Major James Palmer, they have no right to use the Palmer arms as their own, lastly, we will not reproduce the color image of the full Palmer achievement prepared by the Ulster King of Arms. Would we still be violating heraldry etiquette by publishing the Palmer arms quartered with Smyth and Ralphson?
I cannot image that authors of books on heraldry track down all the contemporary owner of the arms they display and discuss in their books and get permission to reproduce the arms. It would seem to me that displaying the arms of others for educational purposes, with a notice that the arms cannot be used as personal arms except by legitimate heirs, should fall within the principle of fair use.
I look forward to reading the collective wisdom of this group on this topic. Thank you.
]]>Examples would include the cantons or inescutcheons of British Baronets; the standardized charged cantons in Napoleonic heraldry signifying various military, civil and ecclesiastical offices or ranks; the addition of (parts or all of) the arms or flag or other insignia of a nation or ruler; and additions commemorating some particular achievement or victory.
But the key element is that an augmentation is awarded by or on behalf of the head of state - and since the US has never AFAIK conferred any such heraldic augmentation, confrtted by the head of some foreign state. It doesn’t include ordinary heraldic charges that may symbolize some achievement or profession or whatever that are included in the normal course of design rather than as a special award.
So the question is whether, or under what circumstances, would the display of an augmentation as defined above be appropriate or inappropriate in American arms, including foreign arms inherited by or granted to an American.
]]>I do agree that good taste is important, but there are many examples of coats of arms (ancient and modern) that would not today be considered good taste—nor would the lifestyle of many grantees of arms in the past!
]]>A person is the heir of both mother’s and father’s arms. (mother’s not having other heirs in her parent’s lineage).
Is it appropriate to use both crests with the quartered arms?
Are there specific cases where it is more correct or less correct - some thoughts:
1. Dad’s are US assumed arms. Mom’s are previously granted by another authority.
2. Dad’s are "old" arms properly granted and/or matriculated from other countries and he’s the "proven" heir. Mom’s are US assumption.
3. Both are "old" arms properly verified, but the grant/matriculation was never applied for because the families immigrated and saw no reason (or didn’t want the expense) of doing such.
There are variations - but, in the US - what does this membership believe appropriate?
]]>To frame my case, let me begin by offering a précis of Fred’s comments as I understand them. I hope I am not distorting his argument by summarizing it.[
While the discussion was in part about how Fred believes the use of personal heraldry is perceived by modern Americans, which I don’t think we can resolve here, he also stated (I think as a matter of objective fact rather than perception) that using personal heraldry necessarily entails “assenting to some semblance of a feudal hierarchy… a stratified society—and placing oneself rather high within it” (#60). Fred characterized armorial bearings as “a symbol [that was] explicitly designed to affirm inequality in the places where [heraldry] evolved” (#64) and contends that “to denude heraldry of any traditional social status connotations” is to “make it something fundamentally different than it generally has been (here or anywhere else)” (#94). Thus, for American heraldists to advocate a universal right to assume arms, independent of social criteria, is basically unheraldic as well as contrary to what the Founders had in mind when they tacitly or explicitly rejected a contradiction between heraldry and republicanism. Finally having thus discarded the inherent connection between arms and status, it is inconsistent to deny anyone’s right to use armorial elements that historically signified status.
In response I promised to give my own views as to “whether the use of arms itself makes a class statement, and if so whether the statement it makes is inconsistent with classic American republicanism.” (#128)
Let me foreshadow just a bit by saying up front that I do not believe everyone should use a coat of arms. I agree with Fred that the universal use of arms is indeed inconsistent with the historical spirit of heraldry. But I think there are differences in my understanding of who is arms-worthy and his that go far beyond mere nuance, and get to the heart of how we should understand personal heraldry in the USA. Moreover, I think that the question "who should?" must be clearly distinguished from "who may?" More on that toward the far-off end of these ramblings.
Before addressing substance, some words about method from Samuel Eliot Morison:
Quote:
It is said that Maestlin, the master of Kepler, remarked after reading the first work of his distinguished pupil: “before Kepler scholars always attacked astronomy from behind” [original in French; my translation]. The same perverse practice, I have observed, distinguishes the historians of American universities. They will begin at the wrong end, with the “dear old College” of their own undergraduate days, and work backwards; they love to interpret the early years of the institution in the light of their personal experience a century or so later. (“Precedence at Harvard College in the Seventeenth Century,” Proc. Am. Antiquarian Soc., 42 (1932) 372)
Morison might as well have been writing about most scholars of heraldry, who regularly interpret the use of arms in other times and places by reference to the theories, rules, and customs of their own time and place, many of which grew up much more recently than the scholars realize. I cannot promise that what follows will be totally free of this tendency or other intellectual biases, but I’ll do my best.
In any event, attacking the issue from the front means going through a certain amount of history. Some of you know the history and will be bored, but bear with me.
First, it would be foolish to deny that heraldry originated and developed in societies that were more or less stratified and hierarchical, almost always more so than the one we live in today. The question, to my mind, is whether the essential character of heraldry is inextricably bound up with the unequal social environment in which it evolved.
So…
]]>Many people ask why they cannot protect their arms in the United States under either the copyright or trademark laws.
It is possible to register one’s arms as a trademark under state or federal law. The problem here is that a registered trademark is valid only if it is actually used in one’s trade or profession. Most armigers do not intend to use their arms for that purpose. Moreover, the same problems concerning the extent to which a design must be altered to constitute a different design arise in the trademark area as well; a court adjudicating a case will not be likely to ask whether the marks are sufficiently differenced under the law of arms but whether a reasonable consumer, seeing the two emblazonments, is likely to confuse one with the other. Even if the arms are used in business, once they are registered as the trademark they are typically tied to the business. If the business is sold, the trademark usually goes to the new owner. Thus, if a business owner has registered his arms as the trademark of his company, and he dies and the company is bought out as part of the estate settlement, his children may find that they have no right to their hereditary arms.
1 - Do all or none or some countries have reciprocity agreements in recognizing C.o.A.s that have been issued outside of that countries jurisdiction?
2- The last paragraph sounds like it is saying that the transfer of business copyright would supercede and render ineligible the rights of Heraldic inheritance - which is kind of a big deal for most armigers.
]]>I wanted to post a short reply to a message in another thread (Alternative Heraldic Headgear), but since it doesn’t have anything to do with headgear I thought I’d start a new thread:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Michael F. McCartney…we were under British rule prior to independence, so it was British laws, values and norms that we either retained or rejected.
Quote:Originally Posted by Joseph McMillan…An interesting statement coming from someone living in California. Mike’s neighbors might ask, as Tonto is said to have asked the Lone Ranger, "Who’s this ‘we,’ Kemosabe?"
I’ll give you that the dominant values and norms in the US derive from 18th century British values and norms, but as for law, in fact a great deal of Western states’ law on matters like marriage, family, inheritance, and real estate is heavily influenced by Spanish law, notably the concept of community property.
Quote:Originally Posted by Michael F. McCartney…Joe- while it’s true that in some subjects California and other states in the SW retained Mexican law…e.g. land and water rights…
One Mexican law that I’m glad wasn’t retained in California law was the 1826 law that, among other things, barred the public use of some personal heraldry: http://cdigital.dgb.uanl.mx/la/1080120377_C/1080008405_T3/1080008405_76.pdf#page=2
According The Mexican Nobility at Independence by the historian Doris Ladd:
Quote:
...to meet the public demand to erase all visible links with the Spanish past, the congress directed the nobles to destroy all public displays of coats of arms…blank shields and ovals on ornate colonial buildings still testify to the mutilation that early Mexican nationalism prescribed to erase the Spanish past. Letters to the editor [of the ‘Aguila mexicana’ newspaper] in 1826 chided those nobles who were slow to remove their arms, castles and lions rampant. Such displays, one writer complained, insulted liberty, for anything that recalled Spain was an insult to Mexico…(pages 160-161)
As a westerner and a fan of Spanish heraldry, it is probably no surprise that I am very sympathetic to the notion that modern American heraldic customs should at least partly take into account the heraldic traditions practiced by the European colonists residing in that particular state/region before independence.