A glorious resignation

The resignation last week of Giles Fraser, canon chancellor of St Paul’s Cathedral in London, was a surprising but welcome reminder of what a public figure publicly standing by their beliefs looks like. On 27 October, senior clergy at the cathedral announced that they would seek legal action to removed the Occupy London Stock Exchange encampment from the steps of the cathedral, where it has squatted for over a fortnight. Reverend Fraser promptly resigned, saying that a police eviction of the occupiers would amount to “violence in the name of the church”.

He later told the Guardian that his decision was “not about my sympathies or what I believe about the camp. I support the right to protest and in a perfect world we could have negotiated. But our legal advice was that this would have implied consent. The church cannot answer peaceful protest with violence.”

Political historians like to refer to the 1982 resignation of Margaret Thatcher’s foreign secretary, Lord Carrington, as the ‘last honourable act in British politics’. Accepting executive responsibility for the Foreign Office’s failure to foresee or prevent the Argentine invasion of the Falklands, Carrington dutifully fell on his sword not because of personal scandal, but on a point of principle.

Where is that spirit now? To our recollection, it last showed face eight years ago, in Robin Cook’s dramatic 2003 departure from the cabinet over the war in Iraq. But the fact that we can remember these names and speeches suggests that they are exceptions proving a rule: no-one in public office seems all that willing to stand by their personal beliefs anymore. If they did, one suspects our coalition government would feature far fewer Liberal Democrats.

Rev Fraser is to be applauded: his exit was a brave statement, well made. It was not an especially grand or flashy resignation - he announced his departure on Twitter - but it was a rare triumph of conscience over status. It was not a political move or a publicity stunt, but rather a man simply standing up to say ‘I cannot be a part of this.’ And that is something we should all admire.