Democracy and the Freedom of the press.

It was actually the German government in the form of chancellor Schleicher - the last chancellor before Hitler -  who was also a general in the army who told Hindenburg that the German army could not suppress civil war, which was all part of his incessant scheming to include the Nazis somehow and avoid a right wing coup in which he himself were not leading. He later did an about turn and claimed that the army could control the situation without any evidence supporting such a change of mind. Hindenburg was thus unconvinced.

Yes it was the 400,000 SA men, not to mention other paramilitaries, that the conservative right feared as I already said, backed by a third of the people, which is the only reason the conservatives felt they had to bring him onside, yet retain control themselves. They succeeded in the former by giving Hitler the chancellorship but utterly failed in the latter. Hitler quickly took control right from the very start.

And yes there was constant street fights between communists and Nazis involving murders, the conservatives sought to bring the Nazis on board to quell this whilst retaining control themselves. It was a terrible mistake, but one made by a conservative clique who themselves sought the overthrow of democracy. Which is partly why they utterly failed to seek the support of the strongest remaining pro-democracy party, the Social Democrats. Their grave mistake was utterly inherent to their own authoritarian agenda.

If our Democracy is built upon an "elusive form of consensus" rather than Law then we are not really a democracy, are we?
We are, at best, a Monarchy pretending to be a Democracy.

When push comes to shove the ONLY thing that will matter in the first instance is "what is legal".
After that we may well have an as yet undefined "constitutional crisis", which may come to some elusive consensus of a solution.

But every constitutional crisis we have had in the past so far has NOT resolved the issue of Royal Assent (because they were never supposed to do so); so why would we assume that a new constitutional crisis would now?

There is ONLY one way to change this and make that change lasting, have a formal, written, protected in law, genuinely democratic, constitution; and make it clear from the get go that if the Monarch refuses to grant Royal Assent to that Constitution we WILL abolish the Monarchy and they will lose all the privileges and public purse handouts that come with that.

All The Best

If the Law - the ONLY things thing that guides both the Police and Judiciary - does not protect and enshrine Democracy what does?

The current Tory Regime has gerrymandered the Constituency Boundaries, and disenfranchised - by their own reckoning - up to 8 million voters.
So "the government of the day" can't be said to protect Democracy.

The current Government was put into power by the people, and those same people sat idly by and did exactly nothing while all this was going on.
So the people can't be said to protect democracy.

Of course this is made almost impossible by Manifesto Pledges no being legally binding, and Government routinely enacting legislation that they made no mention of in their manifestos.

So something has to happen there as well, otherwise there is no real informed decision to be made about who to vote for because their manifestos are effectively meaningless.

All The Best

No the law is built on the democracy which is that consensus. When push comes to shove all that matters is what will/is likely to happen beyond the consensual laws. We have not resolved the Royal Assent issue as it has not needed resolving as it currently works. If it did not we may indeed go to a formal written Constitution but I maintain that our democracy, with all its flaws and inconsistencies is more responsive to the people than any written Constitution that can be seen today. That is largely because the power comes from the people and not from the written Constitution which can, and often is used to prevent the people from having any meaningful power. The EU is a very good example of this Constitutionally restrictive democracy.

The Law is NOT consensual.
If you are speeding you don't have to consent to being ticketed - it just happens.

In fact not only do you not need to consent to be subject to the law, you don't even need to be aware of the law (ignorance of the law is no defence) to be subject to it; and you clearly can not consent to something you are not aware of. 

All The Best

You need to read more carefully, the operative word is NOT "effectively" is IS "actually".
As in "actually" you are wrong.

The Judiciary can NOT make new laws - that requires an Act Of Parliament.
The Judiciary can NOT repeal laws - that requires an Act Of Parliament.
The Judiciary can NOT pass Acts Of Parliament.

All The Best

Of course the law is consensual as it is the result of the democratic process. I may not like all the laws but I recognise that they are derived through the democratic process with all its flaws and inconsistencies. Of course you can consent to that which you are not aware of if you consent to the process that puts it there. I may consent to the purchase of a gift for an ill colleague. I may not be aware of what it is or where it resides but I consented to the process.