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Prince Harry often speaks about his efforts to uphold Princess Diana's legacy in everything that he does. Most recently, of course, the Duke of Sussex paid tribute to his late mother by naming his newborn daughter Lilibet Diana.
While Prince Harry's detractors have criticized him for stepping back from his official royal duties and move to the United States, a close friend of the Princess of Wales, Stewart Pearce, told Us Weekly that she would've been in "complete favor" of her son's decision. “I believe that she would be absolutely thrilled [with both of her sons] because that was her nature. She wasn’t down in the dumps,” Peace explained. “She was a person who loved humor, who loved the levity of life, who loved expanding through life.”
Pearce also confirmed previous reports that, before her death in 1997, Princess Diana was also looking to move to California. The Diana, The Voice Of Change author said she had her “eye on a property” in Malibu, California. “She was talking about buying a property in Malibu [saying] that would be ‘really great’ for the boys to have freedom so that they could surf,” Pearce shared. “Because they’re both very sporty, you know, but they could surf, they could rollerblade, they could Frisbee. So, she’d be in complete favor.”
Back when Prince Harry first moved to California, her former butler and close confidante, Paul Burrell, said Princess Diana believed she and her sons would have a happier, more private life in the United States. "[Their new house] was going to be in Malibu...I saw the plans," he said. "We sat on the floor, spread out all the maps and the layout of the house...She said, 'This is our new life, just won't it be great, think of the lifestyle—nobody's judgmental here in America, you don't have the class system, you don't have the establishment."
Prince Harry has echoed his mother's sentiments, as well, during his sit down with Oprah Winfrey a few months back. "To have outdoor space where I can go for walks with Archie and go for walks as a family and with the dogs...all of these things are just—I guess the highlight for me is sticking him on the back of a bicycle in his little baby seat and taking him on bike rides which is something I was never able to do when I was young," he gushed of his new life in California. "I can seat him on the back and he's got his arms out and he's like 'whoah.'"
In addition to following in her footsteps with his move to the states, Prince Harry and his wife, Meghan Markle, are also carrying on with her charitable endeavors. “They’re really taking on so much of what her legacy is, to bring liberation to the disenfranchised, the disassociated, the LGBTQ+ community, [the] Black Lives Matter [and] Me Too [movements],” Pearce continued. “All of this is within the understanding of what liberation she wanted to bring about in the sense of using her position as an egalitarian or humanitarian role because people looked on her as being of iconic status the most.”
Princess Diana wanted to use that "position in a really positive way to say, ‘Look, if I can support this, then there’s no reason why the collective can’t move into support of this very genuine, authentic, integral process that brings about the liberation of human spirit," Pearce said. “I feel, as you know, that their voice is a voice of liberation and they’re doing exactly what Diana would’ve wanted them to do."