Australia Before Federation

• Australia was settled by immigrants from Britain starting in 1788 with the convict settlement in New South Wales. 

• The principle behind the settlement of NSW and subsequent colonies was 'Terra Nullius', that the existing inhabitants, perhaps some 500,000 Aborigines & Torres Strait Islander people held no title to the land. This remained the legal principle of settlement until the 1990's with the Mabo and Wik decisions of the High Court of Australia.

• Between 1788 and 1836 each of the colonies (now known as states) was established, the early ones, NSW, Tasmania & Queensland as convict colonies, the later colonies of Victoria, Western Australia and, finally, South Australia in 1836, were free colonies.

• From 1856 the British Parliament granted each colony its own responsible form of government. The colonies continued in this way, as distinct states on the Australian continent until Federation in 1901.

• Each colonial and later State Parliament granted democratic rights to its citizens as follows:

Early Moves Towards Federation

• The British Colonial Secretary, Earl Grey, encouraged the colonies to form a federal assembly from 1849. Powerful military alliances formed in Europe and the French and German imperialists were present in the Pacific area from about 1880. The Edwards Report: In 1889 Major-General Edwards, a British general, recommended that the continent should form one central military force. Defence and trade between colonies were two reasons for federating valued by the colonies.

• The "federation movement" of colonial politicians used the slogan "a nation for a continent and a continent for a nation" - no other nation was a continental land mass - during the years they campaigned for federation. Leaders of this movement included Sir Henry Parkes and Mr. Edmund Barton. Parkes in particular recognised that a new Federal government could only be put in place by the votes of a majority of people across the continent.

How Federation Was Achieved

• At the end of the 1800s, Australia was divided into six separate colonies instead of being one nation. But people had been talking for years about whether Australia should be one nation, and in the 1890s a series of meetings (called conventions or conferences) was held to discuss federation of the colonies.

• The Premier of New South Wales, Sir Henry Parkes, had announced in 1889 that the time had come to form a national parliament and government. There were many who did not agree but by 1991, there was a convention held in Sydney to write a federal constitution. This was then sent back to the colonial parliaments for approval. But at the same time, Parkes was losing the leadership of NSW and the issue of federation was no longer a top priority. Without the largest colony, the others could not proceed towards federation.

• In 1893, a conference was held in Corowa on the Murray River and attended by politicians from NSW and Victoria, business representatives from Melbourne and people from Victorian branches of the Australian Natives Association, an organisation which wanted federation. John Quick, a lawyer from Bendigo, suggested that the whole process should start again, but with the people electing delegates to a new conference, which would then write a constitution and put it back to the people at referendums. His scheme was accepted enthusiastically by the conference.

• There was then a meeting of colonial premiers in 1895 in Hobart and Quick's scheme was accepted by New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia and Tasmania. However, Western Australia's parliament agreed only that it would elect delegates to a convention (rather than having the people elect them) and Queensland could not agree and was eventually not represented at the convention at all.

• In 1897, elections were held to choose delegates to attend a convention to draw up a constitution. The convention was held in three sessions in three places: Adelaide, Sydney and Melbourne. This draft constitution was then put to the people at referendums. People in NSW, Victoria, South Australia and Tasmania voted twice. The first time all four colonies voted 'yes' but the vote was not high enough in NSW to satisfy the level set by the parliament. As a result, some changes were made to the proposed constitution and the vote was taken again. This time, the NSW 'yes' vote was high enough and the referendum was put to voters in Queensland and Western Australia, who also voted 'yes'.

• Some of the delegates then had to take the draft constitution to London, so that it could be passed by the British Parliament. After some debate and argument in London it was passed. As a result, the Australian Constitution is in the form of an Act of the British Parliament. As it happened, Western Australia was not mentioned in the preamble to this Act, because Western Australia voted later than the other colonies and was too late to be included.

• The Commonwealth of Australia was proclaimed on 1 January 1901 at a ceremony at Centennial Park in Sydney.

Arguments For Federation

• All the colonies were British and most white people spoke English.

• School systems (which had begun in the 1880s) were teaching patriotic songs, stories and verses.

• Many people moved between the colonies to find work.

• Customs duties hindered trade between the colonies.

• Laws could be enforced better if accused people could not escape to a neighbouring colony.

• Sporting teams had begun to represent Australia. Such a cricket team in 1877 had beaten England in a Test match.

• Popular writers such as Henry Lawson were writing about Australia as a land and nation made by the struggles of ordinary people.

• Germany and France had colonies in New Guinea and the Pacific Islands and could pose a threat. Each Australian colony only had a small armed force.

•  Influential politicians were strongly in favour of Federation and travelled the country giving speeches about it.

Arguments Against Federation

• New South Wales and Victoria were more powerful than the other colonies.

• Each colony had its own characteristics that might be lost after Federation.

• All the colonies already had parliaments of their own.

• Federation would be expensive to achieve and a federated country would be expensive to run.

• The colonies had different policies about immigration, trade and other matters.

• Customs duties protected factories in the smaller colonies from goods made in factories in the larger colonies.

For & Against - Free Trade?

•  One of the big issues about Federation concerned trade. People found it annoying that they had to pay customs duties to take goods over the borders between colonies.

• Victoria had a policy of high duties so that it could protect its industries from overseas competition. New South Wales had a policy of low duties so that the cost of goods could be kept as low as possible and to encourage trade.

• New South Wales and Victoria, as the two largest colonies, were jealous of each other. Although they could agree that it would be better to have free trade within a new nation of Australia they could not agree about what to do about goods coming from overseas. Should they be taxed (in an effort to protect local industries) or should there be completely free trade?

• The smaller colonies also had policies of protection but their customs duties were not as large as those of Victoria. This made New South Wales suspicious about joining a federation. As well, some people in New South Wales thought that since it was the oldest and largest colony, the other colonies should become part of New South Wales if they wanted to become one country.

• The issue of free trade versus protectionism threatened to stand in the way of Federation for some time in the 1890s. But it was resolved by leaving the issue to be decided after Federation had taken place.

Timeline Of Federation

The Australian Constitution

What is a constitution?

A national constitution is a set of rules for governing a country. Such rules may be based on tradition or may be written down in the form of a law or a number of laws. In some countries laws forming the constitution are ordinary laws which can be changed just like any other law, but in most countries the laws forming the constitution have a special status.

The Constitution of Australia has a special status—it cannot be changed in the same way as other laws can be changed and it is a supreme law, that is, it overrides other laws. 

How was the Australian Constitution created?

Before 1901 the present Australian States were separate colonies of the then British Empire. When the colonies decided to join together in a federation, representatives from each colony were elected to attend meetings (called constitutional conventions) to draw up a constitution for the new nation. The draft constitution was later approved by a vote of the people in referenda held in each colony.

The new Australian nation was established on 1 January 1901 following the passing of the Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act by the United Kingdom Parliament. The purpose of the Act was 'to constitute the Commonwealth of Australia'. The Constitution drawn up at the conventions was included as part of this Act, which declared that 'The Constitution of the Commonwealth shall be as follows:— . . .'.

A FEDERAL SYSTEM is a system of government that has one central government to deal with matters pertaining to the whole nation as well as state governments to deal with matters pertaining to the states. Australia has this system. A unitary system on the other hand is one where there is one central government only. This deals with all legislative matters for the country as a whole (e.g. England).

SEPARATION OF POWERS. The Australian constitution is the supreme law in Australia. It was passed by the British in 1900 in a statute called the Commonwealth of Australia Act 1900 (U.K).It provides the whole basis of government in Australia with one provision being the separation of powers. This means that power is distributed between the three arms of government, that is, between the legislative, the executive and the judiciary.

The significance of the separation of powers is that no one group has all the power. The separation of powers helps to ensure that society is protected from corrupt and undemocratic processes.

The Legislature - this is the arm of government that is responsible for the passing of Acts through parliament.

The Executive - this is the arm of government responsible for putting laws into practice. This is done mainly through the government departments.

The Judiciary - This is the arm of government responsible for settling disputes.

THE DIVISION OF POWERS on the other hand, relates to how power is divided between the states and the Commonwealth. For example, the states have power over some areas such as police and hospitals while the Commonwealth may control other areas such as immigration and defence.

Section 51 - This section of the Constitution states the areas over which the commonwealth has jurisdiction. The states retain the law making ability they had before federation unless the constitution has given those powers to the federal government.

The constitution provides for four types of legislative power.

Specific powers - these are areas of the law that are specifically mentioned in section 51 and include banking, immigration and defence.

Residual powers - residual powers are the powers that the states retained after federation. These powers include law enforcement and education.

Concurrent powers - these are areas over which both states and the Commonwealth have legislative power. Section 109 of the constitution provides that the Commonwealth legislation prevails if there is an `inconsistency between state and federal legislation. e.g. taxation and company law.

Exclusive powers - these are areas of the law that the federal government has exclusive power. This includes defence, immigration, customs and excise.

REFERENDUM. The Australian Constitution has changed very little over its 100  year history partly because it cannot be amended the same way as other laws. Section 128 of the Constitution provides procedure by which the Constitution may be changed. It can only change if both the following occur:

A referendum is a specific question given to the entire nation to vote on with the purpose of bringing change to the constitution.

Both houses of parliament agree to the change.

The change is approved in a referendum by a majority of people in a majority of states.

The Australian Parliament

The Commonwealth Parliament is both the focus of national political action and the key institution of government. The role and powers of the Parliament derive from two sources - inherited tradition and the Australian Constitution.

The parliamentary tradition which Australia follows has its philosophical beginnings in ancient Athens. The name parliament is derived (via the French word parlement) from the Latin word meaning 'to speak' or 'to discuss'.

Australian parliamentary tradition derives more directly from the British parliament at Westminster which made laws having force in Australia until well into the twentieth century.

The colonies of Australia, on attaining self-government from 1854 onwards, adopted for their legislatures the forms and traditions of Westminster. Like the Westminster parliament they saw, in the late nineteenth century, the growth of cohesive political parties which eventually brought stability to parliamentary government. These colonial practices and traditions were inherited by the Commonwealth Parliament from its first meeting in 1901.

The framers of the Constitution, many of whom became the first senators and members of the Parliament, also had regard to the federal constitution of the United States, with its emphasis on checks and balances and separation of powers.

The Commonwealth Parliament is composed of three distinct elements

the Queen, represented by the Governor-General

the Senate

the House of Representatives.

These three elements together characterise Australia as being a constitutional monarchy, a federation and a parliamentary democracy.