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Commomwealth Day

Commonwealth Day is the annual celebration of the Commonwealth of Nations held on the second Monday in March, and which is marked by a multi-faith service in Westminster Abbey normally attended by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, Head of the Commonwealth, the Commonwealth Secretary-General and the Commonwealth High Commissioners in London. The Queen delivers an address to the Commonwealth which is broadcast throughout the world on the BBC.

History

After the death in 1901 of Queen Victoria, the first British Monarch who used the style Emperor/Empress of India (in the British position as Paramount ruler) in addition to the royal title of the UK, her birthday, May 24, was made an annual commemoration under the name Empire Day. This day was celebrated with families lighting fireworks in their back-gardens or attending community bonfires. It was a day that gave Australians a chance to show their pride in being part of the British Empire.

In 1958 Empire Day was renamed Commonwealth Day, in accordance with the new post-colonial form of the forum of Realms, kingdoms, and republics bound by the former rule of the British crown.

The National Council in Canada of the Royal Commonwealth Society expressed in a letter to then Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, in 1973, that Commonwealth Day should be observed on the same day throughout all the countries of the Commonwealth. They asked that this notion be incuded on the agenda of the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting to be held in Ottawa that year. The item appeared on the agenda of the 1975 meeting, and it was agreed that the Commonwealth Secretariat select a date, preferably one without previous historical connotations. At the meeting of Secretariat officials in Canberra in 1976 the Canadian propsal of the second Monday in March was adopted.