To The Age        Amanda Vanstone reasonably argues ("Shorten's republic road map will only set us back", 26/11) that Australians should seek to find a new unity and also a head of state that is completely our own. She uses these proposals to justify the republican cause; but in themselves they do not do that. Nowhere in her article is there any attempt to show that a republic would be better for us than a monarchy. Phrases like "a nation that has come of age" are mere rhetoric. We monarchists insist that a sacred monarchy is always superior in principle to any kind of republic; it has an accordance with truth, a dignity and an inspirational power that Australians will be wise to retain in one form or another.
  Nigel Jackson, Belgrave, Vic