Twins for France's would-be-king

FRENCH royalists, who see this month’s Bastille Day celebrations as a reminder of tragedy, can cheer themselves up with news of the birth of a new royal heir – another Louis.

He was born one minute before twin Alphonse and would succeed his father Louis de Bourbon, Duke of Anjou, 36, in the unlikely event that France restores the monarchy. The boys have the titles of Dukes of Bourgogne and Berry, respectively, but if the former became king he would become Louis XX (or XXI if his father rules first). Their father, who lives in New York, already has a daughter, Eugénie, born in 2007, but women cannot traditionally rule in their own right in France. He has a Venezuelan wife, Marie-Marguerite.

The duke is said by his staff to be a “modern prince,” as he works in charge of international relations for a Venezuelan bank.

The Bourbon line is the one supported by the majority of France’s monarchists, called “legitimists,” although a significant minority support the Orléans line, whose contender is Henri d’Orléans, Count of Paris, 77.

His heir Jean d’Orléans, Duke of Vendôme, 37, had a baby boy with wife Philomena, last year. The count grew up abroad due to an 1886 law (scrapped in 1950) which banned the heads of France’s royal families and their eldest sons from France. It was passed to discourage royalism after an extravagant marriage in Paris between an Orléans princess and a Portuguese prince.

Since 2001 the Alliance Royale party has aimed to give a common voice to royalism, which includes other small factions, including one that thinks God will designate the true king when the right time comes.

They propose keeping most institutions but replacing the president with a king, who they say would be better as he would be above party politics.