This might not be unprecedented, but it’s pretty damn close. The last time a senior member of the royal family was hauled in by the authorities was Charles I during the English Civil War.

Charles had tried to challenge the authority of MPs – striding into the Commons, searching for his critics and eventually raising his standard against the forces of parliament. This turned out to be a very bad idea. He ended up being defeated in a series of battles, before being put on trial in Westminster Hall.

“The authority of obedience unto Kings is clearly warranted and strictly commanded in both the Old and New Testament,” he said. “No learned lawyer will affirm that an impeachment can lie against the King… one of their maxims is that the King can do no wrong.” It didn’t work. On 30 January 1649, at around 2pm, they cut his head off on Whitehall.

A monarch or a businessman today would never use Charles I’s words, but they might secretly share the underlying sentiment.

These men might not share Charles I’s view of the divine rights of kings, but they certainly share his assumption that the rules do not apply to them. They have their own “learned lawyer” to affirm that they “can do no wrong”.

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Those with private wealth can harness the legal system to their advantage, using aggressive litigation, or libel, or whatever other ingenious and vexatious legal avenue exists for them to advance their aims. Those without funds cannot.

Wherever you look you see the effect of this inequality. Sometimes it is even baked into law. Labour’s current immigration proposals would offer people settlement very quickly if they’re in a high-paying job, but make them wait years if they’re in a low-paying job, as if our legal status should be defined by our income.

There is another idea, which has a long heritage in this country. While Charles I was sat awaiting trial, a proto-liberal group called the Levellers wrote an extraordinary document called the Agreement of the People. This document helped forge the new age of liberty and equality – first in England, then later in the US and France. No-one really talks about it, but it is a crucial chapter in the history of ideas.

Instead of a divine right of kings, it argued for inalienable individual rights and equality before the law. Discrimination would be prohibited on the basis of “tenure, estate, charter, degree, birth or place”. In the end, the Leveller Colonel Thomas Rainsborough said it best: “Really I think the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live as the greatest he”.

These are the principles that our modern society evolved from and was established upon. They are the principles that, centuries later, would lead Thames Valley Police to the door of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, where they arrested him on suspicion of misconduct in public office.

An arrest is not an indication of guilt and Mountbatten-Windsor has consistently denied any wrongdoing. But the most striking impact of today’s events was the spectacle of it, rather than the concrete legal consequence. It was a demonstration that the police would arrest a former prince just as they would arrest a poor man in his flat, or a homeless man on the street corner.

Look abroad. Every country has its own Epstein scandal. Every part of our cultural life – from scientists to entrepreneurs to activists – has its own revelations to grapple with. Just this morning, Bill Gates cancelled a speech on AI as he fought for his reputation over his links with Epstein.

But very few other countries are seeing these dramatic and decisive steps taken against the culprits. This is partly because the offence of misconduct in public office is much easier to demonstrate than those involving young girls. But it is also testament to something grander and more profound: a continued demonstration of universal legal standards. A commitment, centuries later, to the ideas first put forward by the Levellers during the English Civil War.

For many, this will be a day of shame. The king’s brother, led away by police, sitting in custody. In fact, it should be a day of national pride, for those who recognise the things we can still rightfully be proud about in this country.

There’s no better patriotic sight than the equal application of the law. And no more satisfying way of demonstrating that than to see a former prince arrested.

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