State of the Union draped in pomp and circumstance.(Perspective)

Byline: GENE HEALY

"A speech from the throne," Thomas Jefferson called it. And as Washington waits for President Bush's sixth State of the Union address Tuesday night, the monarchical metaphor seems as apt as ever.

In recent weeks, the President has reserved the right to open Americans' mail and, in the face of an electoral rebuke of his Iraq policy, announced that he's throwing more than 20,000 more American soldiers into the midst of that country's burgeoning civil war.

Jefferson's primary complaint was that our first two presidents chose to deliver their annual messages in person before both houses of Congress - a practice he regarded as "an English habit, tending to familiarize the public with monarchical ideas."

But even Jefferson …