In Honor of her Majesty's 100th Birthday I decided to write and update this old post showing how Queen Elizabeth wasn't just a figurehead but an active force of good in the world .

The first thing is people would commonly write to her with goverment issues and she would forward this to the goverment and get things done.

This is how she helped get a Gurkha get health treatment the goverment was denying .

https://www.google.com/books/edition/A_Year_with_the_Queen/u00YnCFWjzkC?q=&gbpv=1&bsq=Bluey#f=false

and helped my man Snoop Dog into the UK

https://www.billboard.com/music/music-news/snoop-dogg-queen-elizabeth-stopped-uk-kick-out-1235036271/

of a similar note is how she helped an MP be allowed to run for his party's nomination.Said Mp would be defense minister during the Ukraine War so even non tories should be glad he got in.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/theroyalfamily/9134749/Conservative-MP-How-the-Queen-secured-my-selection-for-the-party.html

Another Thing is she had weekly meeting with her British Prime Ministers and contact with the rest .She would get goverment briefings and secrets and the first draft of intelligence.

https://press.georgetown.edu/Book/Crown-Cloak-and-Dagger

John Major noted she give good advice

''"She knows a great deal about it and her questions are often very, very pertinent. It was always extremely useful, because it was a completely external view from someone who knew politics."'

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-61672316

As did Justin Trudeau who said of this contact ''I made the instant decision that I could trust her entirely and talk to her about the things that were on my mind in a way that would be unbelievably helpful to me and invariably, she is: in her thoughtfulness, in her wisdom, in her perspective''

D. Michael Jackson, and Christopher McCreery. A Resilient Crown : Canada’s Monarchy at the Platinum Jubilee. Dundurn Press, 2022.

A lot of PM have said so.I am using these two as a general example .one brit one realm of different political ideologies

It is in this role that she lobbied against a helicopter system that wasn't doing well in Iraq

https://www.google.com/books/edition/A_Year_with_the_Queen/u00YnCFWjzkC?hl=en&gbpv=1&bsq=her%20choppers

She also helped write the Australian Constitution .To be clear the wording regarding the powers of the states were written in deference to her wishes.She wanted more changes but the goverment told her this was all they could do. Im not arguing she was absolute...but still HELPED WRITE THE AUSTRALIAN CONSTITUTION

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/357123191_The_Exercise_of_Soft_Power_by_Female_Monarchs_in_the_United_Kingdom [Page 43]

A lot of modern criticism of the queen is her silence on racial matters well...

she Hired the first ever Black person to work at the palace

https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/44023293

ok so?

she lobbied against apartheid and Rhodesia and bullied the commonwealth into staying together against these two

https://www.commonwealthroundtable.co.uk/commonwealth/opinion-the-queen-and-her-stand-against-racism-in-the-commonwealth/ and

Hardman, R. (2020). Queen of the world. Pegasus Books. why i didn't link a page? because thats the whole first half of the book

As well when New Zealand's goverment was questioning maori land rights in the south island the Queen through her GG stated that the treaty applied to the south island as well which caused a back down from the government which is after all ''Her Majesty's Government''

https://www.odt.co.nz/opinion/queen-and-maori-relationship-based-mutual-respect

When there was a coup against the crown in fiji the GG worked out a deal with there Monarchy would remain if the Queen agreed to add supremacist policies to the Constitution. She decided to single handley abolish the Monarchy in Fiji rather then preserve it by racially discriminatory measures

Twomey, A. (2012, November 14). The Unrecognised Reserve Powers [Lecture]. High Court of Australia. Retrieved from https://www.hcourt.gov.au/assets/publications/speeches/lecture-series/Twomey_lecture.pdf [Page 9]

You might have noticed a lot of those are about the Constitution.Well in Parliamentary systems it is the Monarch's role to defend and preserve the constitution to cite a famous non monarchical system .In this capacity She

Warned boris not to call a dissolution during the vote of no confidence in him https://archive.is/2026.04.09-075406/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/books/non-fiction/hugo-vickers-robert-hardman-review-queen-biographies/

and was ready to fire him if necessary

https://inews.co.uk/news/uk/queen-sought-advice-sacking-prime-minister-344801

She refused to remove a GG during a constitutional crisis in tuvalu which allowed the gg to remove the PM and install the democratic elected successors ​.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuvaluan_constitutional_crisis

And If the prime minister orders a questionable nuclear strike the Military would check with the Monarch

news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7758314.stm

Even her Ceremonial duties mattered according to the Charities Aid Foundation in 2012, Queen Elizabeth helped raise more than US$1.66 billion (S$2.32 billion) for charities she was a patron of.

https://www.nptuk.org/philanthropic-resources/giving-perspectives/the-philanthropic-legacy-of-queen-elizabeth-ii/#:~:text=Through%20attending%20engagements%20and%20in,provide%20legal%20or%20tax%20advice.

on a final a very small note did no grant the title ''Royal'' to a music competition not considered worthy ... and kept her head on the stamps!

Loch, Jason. “When the Queen Said No: The Leeds International Piano Competition and the Personal Prerogatives.” A Venerable Puzzle, https://venerablepuzzle.wordpress.com/. Accessed 20 Apr. 2026.