The Australian Republic Issue

Tony Abbott

A Minimal Monarchy (Missing)

Extracts from his "book-length defence of the Australian Constitution".

John Burge

The Push for a Republic: The Real Reasons behind It

A somewhat meandering essay which has more to say about conspiracies (and the threat of World Government) than the republic issue. ("Becoming a republic and changing our flag will divorce us from our Christian heritage and English system of law which we inher[it]ed from England. This includes the rights we take for granted.")

Sir Harry Gibbs

Remove the Queen and the Whole Structure Could Fall

• An edited text of a speech given to Australians for Constitutional Monarchy (full text is at this (unofficial) ACM site).
• The edited version is at the National Centre for Australian Studies site. For more articles & extracts (mostly historical) on matters monarchy, and to a lesser degree the republican debate, see this page of theirs.
• Note: both pages have vanished from the WWW. Linked disabled.

Wayne Hall

The Australian Republic Takes A Nose-Dive

• A perspective on the Australian republic issue.
• "Voting for the Queen in November will not mean that Australians are behind the times. It will mean that the most elaborate and single-minded network of collusion between Australian politicians and the international media is not yet capable of persuading an educated and still relatively prosperous and confident people to jump out of the frying pan into the fire."

John Howard MP

Mr Keating's Mirage on the Hill

Paper presented to the Samuel Griffith Society in 1994.

Bruce A Knox

Fantasies and Furphies: The Australian Republican Agenda

Paper presented to the Samuel Griffith Society in 1992

Sir David Smith

Australia's Head of State

• An article appearing in the Australian National Review, October 1996. At The Monarchist League in Australia's site.
• The second half deals (in large measure) with the media's attitude to the republic issue (and the media's attitude to the public's attitude), and offers some barbed comments.

Our Cultural Heritage: Parliament and the Constitution (missing)

Public lecture for the Australian Academy of the Humanities at the Australian Academy of Science, Canberra, 6 November 1997. Although he does state his position ("I could never vote for a republic"), the lecture is less concerned with debating the republic issue per se than with highlighting the various merits of the existing system. ("The core practices and traditions of our system of government as a constitutional monarchy are not dead relics of the past.")

Some Thoughts on the Monarchy/Republic Debate

Paper presented to the Samuel Griffith Society in 1992

Some Thoughts on the Monarchy Republic Debate Paper (51K)

• Delivered at constitutional law seminar at the ANU in 1994. At The Monarchist League in Australia's site. (Note: this is a different paper to his other one above.)
• "It's interesting to note that, of the six oldest continuous democratic nations in the world ["uninterrupted by dictatorship of the left or right, or by foreign conquest and occupation"], four - Britain, the United States, Canada and Australia - are of British origin, and four - Britain, Canada, Sweden and Australia - are monarchies." [He identifies the sixth as Switzerland.]

Lloyd Waddy

The Republic: Will Blinky be the Only Bill?

• Paper presented to the Samuel Griffith Society in 1994.
• "Over 30 years before Australia adopted its federal Constitution, Walter Bagehot, the political journalist, was able to point out that after 1832 the constitutional monarchy had given way to 'a disguised republic'. He wrote that 'the appendages of a monarchy' had 'been converted into the essence of a republic,' which had its 'dignified' and its 'efficient' parts. If that were the state of political thought by 1867, no wonder the new constitutional monarchy of Australia was readily called a 'Commonwealth'. No wonder, too, that in our own literature, we of Australians for Constitutional Monarchy refer to our present constitutional arrangements as being a 'Crowned Republic'."

Kim Beazley MP

The Republic in the Year Ahead

An Australia Day address delivered 25/1/1999 that deals with republic issues and the Convention's chosen model in particular. Stored at an archived copy of the Australian Republican Movement site maintained by the National Library of Australia.

Donald Brook

A Thoroughly Australian Head of State

In which an unusual mechanism is proposed for having the Head of State deal with "unsettlable" questions.

Peter Collins

New Name for the Republic: "Commonwealth of Australia"

Speech by the NSW Opposition Leader. Delivered 27 January 1997. Stored at the ARM site. Names, flags, and anthems. ("First things first: let Australians resolve the issue of constitutional change [to a republic] by referendum; then later let there be a debate and separate referendum about the Australian flag.")

Sir Zelman Cowen

Further Reflections on an Australian Republic (missing)

• The Robert Menzies lecture for 1995. Delivered 25 November, 1995. Stored at the The Monarchist League in Australia site.
• Note: approves of the Keating plan for a Australian republic (as opposed to an Australian republic per se: "For me, in making a judgment on the issue, it has always been necessary to see the 'detail' of the proposal, that is to say the content of the package proposed.").

Elizabeth Evatt

Human Rights and the Republic (missing)

Speech presented to the Evatt Foundation on Wednesday, January 24, 1995 (but events page suggests 1996!).

Nick Greiner

The Republic and the Coalition

Speech to the South Australian branch of the ARM. Delivered 17/5/1996. The republic issue from a Coalition (and 1996) perspective. Stored at the ARM site.

John Hirst

The Republic and Our British Heritage

Paper presented to the Samuel Griffith Society in 1993.

Cheryl Kernot

Ladies, Bring a Template: Women and the Australian Republic

Speech(?) presented to The Australian Republican Movement, Perth, 21 May 1997. Note: No longer appears to be on-line.

Jenny Lee

Australia becoming a Republic

The National Republicans: The Movement of Australian Nativism

Republic vs Monarchy

Author unknown. Best described as a manifesto. (One puzzle: they envisage an "Executive President and Council" chosen by a "National Assembly" but also "advance a 'ceremonial style' Australian Governor, appointed by and from Provincial Governors elected directly by citizens".) The organisation modestly describes itself as the "only true Australian Revolutionary Left organisation".

Senator Marise Payne

Speech to the Women's Constitutional Conference

Given 30 January 1998.

Speech to the Young Republican's Conference

Given 27 July 1997.

Andrew Robb

Our Own Can Reign over Us

• Originally published in The Australian on 12/9/1997. Brief. Stored at the ARM site.
• "As long as the issue is approached with a genuine intent to preserve the essential principles and conventions contained in our Constitution, then the question of an Australian head of State becomes a matter where eventually we must collectively back our instincts. I think I have long shared the instincts of most Australians who in their hearts feel It is time that we had our very own Australian head of State who reigns but does not rule."

Thomas Ross

Colony and Empire (133K)

Looks at the relationship between Australian and Britain, and (indirectly) matters republic, from an historical and nationalistic perspective. Subtitled: "A Broad Background to Australia's Subservient Relationship with Britain". At the Australian Nationalism Information Database site.

Judith Sutton

The Power of an Idea Whose Time Has Come

Speech delivered on 20/1/1997. The First Fleet, Lang, Parkes, and an Australian republic. Stored at the ARM site.

Malcolm Turnbull

The Republic is in Sight

• An address delivered 10/12/1998 to an ARM dinner. For the most part a rallying speech to the faithful outlining the ARM's plans for the year ahead. Stored at the ARM site.
• "Those who say we won't vote for the Republic until it solves every Constitutional problem will be living under a Monarchy forever."

Uniya

Will the Republic Mean More Jobs?

• By Paul Smyth of Uniya, the Jesuit Social Justice Centre. From the Uniya Newsletter of Autumn 1995.
• "DEBATE about the Republic is often dismissed as a political diversion from fundamental issues like unemployment. My own reflections after the Uniya seminar An Australian Republic: Participation and Citizenship suggest that restoration of the right to work may well depend on us becoming a truly Australian republic."

Steve Vizard

Australia Day Address

Delivered 22/1/1999 at the Melbourne Convention Centre. "Australianness", Anzacs, the republic, and other issues. Stored at the ARM site.

McKenzie Wark

0. Introducing the virtual republic (103K)

Discursive and erudite essay that touches on matters republic, being an expanded version of the introduction to Wark's second book. ("'Republic' for most people really means finding a way in which Australians can truly govern themselves.")

Tony Abbott

The Liberal Party and the Constitution

• Tony Abbott angles for the pro-republican vote in the lead-up to the March 1996 federal election. Seems to be an expanded version of the article at the Intercoast site. At least part was originally published in The Adelaide Review, January 1996.
• "Serious republicans know that their goal is only attainable under a Coalition Government."

Alan Atkinson

"Monarchy, Democracy, and Folklore" and "The Bunyip Monarchy"

"Monarchy, Democracy, and Folklore" was published in Australian Folklore - A Yearly Journal of Folklore Studies, No.9 (July 1994) pp. 8-11.

Faith Bandler

Faith Bandler--Viewpoint

• Added more for completeness sake rather than relevance to this webpage. Part of a collection of viewpoints by various "prominent Australians" at the ABC's 1998 Convention website. They were asked "to write...on the theme of the [1998] Convention--that is, about the Republican debate, the Constitution, or the questions of national identity that the debate raises." In this instance, a "campaigner for the rights of indigenous Australians" gives her viewpoint. Less happily, she never once mentions either the convention or the republic, even in relation to "questions of national identity" (which do get an airing).
• Also includes a link to "Education Notes" (also at the ABC site), prepared by Bryan Moloney, on her viewpoint.

P. Danaher

"No Republic" in Central Queensland: Regional Culture and Constitutional Forms (Missing)

An academic paper from a conference (Mapping Regional Cultures") held at Central Queensland University in July 1996. Explores "the...issue of the connections between opposition in Central Queensland to an Australian republic and the existence and constituency of a 'regional culture' in this area."

Professor David Flint

The Republic and the Media

• An Address to Australians for Constitutional Monarchy Seminar, Sydney, 17 July 1995. Stored at the The Monarchist League in Australia site.
• "I do not see an easy path in Australia becoming a republic."

The Queen in the Commonwealth

An Address to Australians for Constitutional Monarchy, Sydney, 5 December 1996. Stored at the The Monarchist League in Australia site.

L. J. Goulding

Constitutional Monarchy vs. Republicanism--Australia a Republic?

Largely (but not completely) non-committal. Dated 11/12/1993. Looks "at the definition of a republic and some historical perspectives", then at "some reasons why this issue is intensifying at this time [ie 1993]", considering "both the pro-monarchy and pro-republican arguments and where the major political parties stand", and then finally "at the processes and problems involved with change or reform." At Janet's Women's News site.

Green Left Weekly

The republic debate: How much should change? (missing)

By Karen S. Fredericks. The views of a "group of left and community activists" are canvassed for an issue of the GLW. Date of original publication probably 1993. The topic discussed: then Prime Minister Keating's New Visions for Australia speech at the Evatt Foundation annual dinner. (Bit uncertain where to park this one. Although occasionally the views expressed by some of those interviewed are pro-republican, most are more non-committal, focussing on other "green left" issues.)

Nigel Greenwood QC

The Significance of the Crown (missing)

Brief. A paper in Vol 1 Issue 2 of the ACM's online "newspaper" Australian Constitutional News.

Pip Hinman

What about judges? (missing)

• Brief. "We should make use of the opportunity afforded by the republic debate to push for some fundamental changes. For a start, why can't we elect our judges? It's not only a question of chucking out the wigs and gowns and other musty and decrepit paraphernalia and rituals, but also of making judges more representative of ordinary people and subjecting them to some real democratic control."
• Note: the URL identifies this as the Green Left Weekly homepage, but this site (as well as its former one) seems otherwise inaccessible.

John Howard MP

Transcripts of 3 interviews relating to the republic issue:

• With Anna Reynolds on Radio 4QR (13 June 1995) (missing)
• With Paul Lyneham on ABC TV's 7:30 Report (13 June 1995) (missing)
• Doorstop Interview at Caloundra (Qld) (12 June 1995) (missing)

Politics and Patriotism: A Reflection on the National Identity Debate (missing)

A Headland speech of 13 December 1995 at Bryan Palmer's Australian Politics site.

The 5th Annual Sir Edward "Weary" Dunlop Asialink Lecture

Address given on 11 November 1997. At the PM's website. Discusses the republic, the (then forthcoming) convention, "Weary" Dunlop, and other matters. ("The debate is not about who is the better, more patriotic Australian. There are people of good will in this debate who have genuine differences. There are decent, loyal and passionate Australians on both sides of the argument. There are Liberals who believe in an Australian republic just as there are committed Labor people who defend what we've got.")

Michael Kirby (High Court Justice)

The Constitutional Centenary and the Counting of Blessings

• The 5th Sir Ninian Stephen lecture at the University of Newcastle, NSW, March 1997. Offers a perspective on a variety of issues, including the republic. At the High Court's website.
• "Some of the recent advocacy for an Australian republic seems curiously outdated: at least when expressed in the form of appeals to nationalism. It appears more in keeping with the 19th than the 21st century. But other, more rational, voices suggest that a change in this feature of the Constitution is but a natural next step in an historical evolution which has been going on since 1901."

Bryan Palmer

An Australian Republic

What is a republic? "Key arguments" for and against an Australian republic, & the 1999 referendum. Plus links to various WWW resources. The site also includes pages on:

• The [Australian] Head of State
• The Executive Arm of Government
• The Conventions of Responsible Government
  With special reference to their operation in Australia.
• The Reserve Powers of the Governor-General

John Paul

The Head of State in Australia

Paper presented to the Samuel Griffith Society in 1992.

The 1944 Referendum

Dr Evatt & the post-War reconstruction constitutional amendment. Sees a cautionary lesson for the (Keating) republic. Paper presented to the Samuel Griffith Society in 1993.

Basil Smith

A Republic? (missing)

• Appendix B of A Chariot of Fire: Secret Ballots in Parliament ("A critical examination of our Australian political system")
• Pro neither side. ("In time we may have a republic. But it had better not be before we have sorted out our democracy.")
  • Various Thoughts by Smith on the republic issue and the convention.

Sir David Smith

An Australian Head of State: An Historical and Contemporary Perspective

• A lecture in the Australian Senate's Occasional Lecture Series, Parliament House, Canberra, November 1995. At The Monarchist League in Australia's site. Seems to be a response to a lecture given by Senator Baden Teague earlier that year. (A PDF version of the same lecture is available here at the Senate's website.)
• Hard to know where to place this one. For the most part, a (largely) non-committal (and not un-useful) historical survey (eg Issacs, McKell, the dilemma faced by Casey when Holt vanished) of the Governor-General-ship, but with some (mild) comments on the Keating plan near the end.

Western Australia Constitutional Committee

The Republic: A WA Perspective (Missing)

The Premier of Western Australia gives an overview of the report of the Western Australia Constitutional Committee, part of which dealt with the republic issue from a State perspective.

Dr Elaine Thompson

From the World's Democratic Laboratory to Demosclerosis

• "Demosclerosis", Australia, and the republic issue. At an archived copy of the Real Republic site.
• "In 1994 an American analyst, Jonathon Rauch used the term, 'demosclerosis' to describe what he saw as the progressive loss of the ability of the American government to adapt. He was talking about the loss of flexibility of the whole of American government: total hardening of the connective tissues of government. ... In the second half of the 19th century Australia was dubbed the democratic laboratory of the world. In the almost 150 years since the Australian colonies gained self-government, we have ceased to be the country where optimism, innocence, enthusiasm and, most of all, trust in the people were the hallmarks of our way of doing democracy and have accreted a system dominated by an arrogant Government with a managerialist approach to governing. Our political leadership appears, all too often, to be avoiding the mechanisms of democratic accountability built into our system--accountability to the elected parliament. It also appears unwilling to trust the people."

Kay Barney (editor)

Centrifuge: An Australian Republic

A series of four brief essays by various authors in Vol 26 No. of the ANU Reporter. (Original is here (141K).)

Sir Walter Campbell (Governor of Queensland 1985-1992)

Comments on the Role of a State Governor (with Particular Reference to Queensland)

Address to the Australian Institute of Public Administration (Queensland Division) on 22nd March, 1988. Stored at the The Monarchist League in Australia site. Makes a passing reference to an Australian republic. Of greater interest are his comments regarding constitutional practices (aka conventions).

Dr Jennifer Curtin

The 1998 Women's Constitutional Convention

A research note of the Department of the (Federal) Parliamentary Library. Brief.

Harry Evans (Clerk of the Senate)

Essays on Republicanism: small "r" republicanism (PDF)

Papers on Parliament No. 24, September 1994. Seven brief essays (six extracted from print publications & one unpublished) that "draw attention" to particular issues concerning an Australian republic "without any pretence of analysing them in great depth." Includes an extensive bibliography.

Peter Lawrence

Constitutional Material (this file: 116K; 2nd file: 149K)

Hard to know where to park this one. Two webpages (the link above is to the first, at the top of which is a table of contents with links to the second) containing a diverse collection of materials, much of it relevant to the republic issue. Much of it was originally prepared for the newsletter of the Victorian Chapter of the Constitutional Centenary Foundation, which the author was editor of at the time. There are historical essays (eg "How not to do it"), working papers for a "comparative survey" of monarchies and republics, notes on an alternate republican model, and other materials (including an unpublished letter to the Australian Financial Review) giving a "brief description of CCF censorship").

Jenny Lee and Rhonda Marree

Cultural Views: Australia as a Republic (missing)

Outlines the policies concerning the republic proposed by the ALP and the Liberal Party, plus presents the results of an opinion poll of "Fifty interviews...conducted in Brunswick [Victoria?], with a cross-section of nationalities and ages being asked how they feel about a Republic."

Peter Spearritt and David Walker

An independent Australia?

Part of a study guide for Monash University's AUS13 course.

Matthew Ward

"Some Bloody Fool President!": Tanner Vs the Republic

The "Tanner" of the title is Godrey Tanner. A reminiscence between Tanner and Thomas Keneally on the occasion of what sounds the Legal Forum on the Republic held in the Great Hall at Sydney University. At the webpage version of the Godfrey Tanner Edition of OPUS of Newcastle University.

The Australian Republic (Missing)

• By Gwynne Dyer in the Cyprus News. November 11, 1997.
• Basically takes an "it's inevitable" stance, with New Zealand doomed to follow, Britain teetering, and Canada, well..."It is a matter of permanent astonishment that Canada has not offered the olive branch of a republic to its non-British majority." As for Australia: "it is the Australians who have started the landslide."

Australia: 'cultural cringe' and the crown

By John Shaw in the Christian Science Monitor. January 27, 1999. A summary of some of the arguments and aspects of the republic issue.

To Be or Not to Be a Republic? Australians Ask

By Ruth Walker in the Christian Science Monitor. May 20, 1998. Looks back at the February Convention.

He's still the one: Hendo heads presidential poll!

Author unknown. On the eve of the 1998 Convention, The Bug commissions "the respected Trotter Organisation" to do an opinion poll "to determine just whom we wanted to lead us into the third millennium."

Oh, my God...It's Preamble Man!

Author unknown. Someone has a dig (so to speak) at the proposed preamble (and Canberra in general). At The Bug website, an online webzine.

Newcastle, NSW

Communiques (missing)

Links to communiques held at this site from over 20 such local conventions across the country. The communiques summarise the positions reached at these local conventions.

Roy Morgan Polls

Roy Morgan has published a number of public opinion polls about the republic on its website. Including:

• Finding No. 3018: Support for Republic Reaches All Time High Following the Death of Princess Diana (Sept. 1997)
• Finding No. 3048: Half of All Australians Support Republic--Majority Want Referendum Held Before or At Next Federal Election (Dec 1997)
• Finding No. 3054: Support For A Republic Stable--However Australians Divided On Three Constitutional Convention Options (Feb 1998)

Various

Opinion polls on an Australian republic: 1953 - 1997

At an archived copy of the Australian Republican Movement site maintained by the National Library of Australia.

The Commonwealth of Nations

The Commonwealth of Nations

Author unknown. Republicanism and the Commonwealth. At an archived copy of the Australian Republican Movement site maintained by the National Library of Australia. (Another briefer, less comprehensive version can be found here at the real ARM site.)

The Flag

A Flag for an Australian Republic with a Post-Colonial Attitude

"The rules of vexillology are derived from heraldic tradition and it could be alright for an Australian Republic to break from heraldic tradition just a little."

Republicanism and the Australian Flag

• At the ARM's site. Author unknown.
• Note: one of the statements in this essay needs to be approached with caution. After noting that "the Australian flag is governed by an Act of Parliament, the Flags Act 1953" and that that Act requires a "national vote or plebiscite be held before the Government could change the flag", it goes on: "This Act also requires that the current Australian flag must be one of the options at the plebiscite should such a vote ever be held. Hence to change the flag, the Australian people would have to explicitly vote for a new design in preference to the current flag." The Flags Act is an ordinary Act of the Federal Parliament; and like any other ordinary Act of the Federal Parliament can be amended or repealed at any time and without the approval of the voters. Only bills to amend the Constitution must always be put to referendum.

Name Changes

Presidential Address: The Australian Republic and the Royal Society of New South Wales

A summary of the address given by Dr D.J. O'Connor, Retiring President of the Royal Society of New South Wales on 7 April 1999. At the society's website. ("Dr O'Connor concluded that in the event of a 'Yes' vote, there will be no immediate requirement to change the name of the Royal Society of New South Wales. Indeed, Dr O'Connor suggested that the Society should retain the term Royal in its name and should defend its retention. The Society should change its name only if required by Government legislation.")

Note that these links are only about other materials, and the amount of material actually available online may vary. Because I have not seen most of these publications, except what is available online I have not classified them as pro-republic or pro-monarchy etc. I have, however, divided them into those which deal specifically with the Australian republic issue and those in which that particular issue forms only part of a work which seems to deal with the republic/monarchy issue in more general terms.

The Case for Yes: The Australian Republic (missing)

Edited by John Uhr. Precis, table of contents.

For the Sovereignty of the People (missing)

• By Nigel Greenwood. "A Conversation with Niccolo's Ghost, and a Defence of the Crown in the Westminster System"
• Table of contents, excerpts, & reviews available online.
• Judging from the table of contents, a wide-ranging study, from (inter alia) Britain to the US to the Weimar republic to the Australia republic issue ("Dismissal...Disastrous model proposed for Australian republic", "Australia: a 'crowned republic'?").
• Described in the following fashion by the author in an email to me:

  "It argues that the republican debate in this country has, in a profound manner, missed the point. Rather than being purely self-referential within Australia, it takes a long hard look at Watergate and Iran-Contra in the United States, and at the traditional legal implications for Australian police, servicemen etc. being 'servants of the Crown'. In contrast with US executive lawlessness, it looks at the Game-Lang affair in NSW in the 1930s, where an apolitical Governor was confronted with grossly illegal activities committed by a NSW Premier. As the nature of the Lang dismissal has recently suffered historical revisionism, the correspondence between Lang and Game is reproduced in full."

Hot Topics No. 22: A Republic?

Compiled by the Legal Information Access Centre (LIAC). The webpage linked here gives a very brief description of the book. That book provides (amongst other things) an overview of the history of republicanism in Australia, the 1998 Convention, an explanation of the key constitutional issues, and a summary of the arguments presented by both monarchists and republicans. STOP PRESS: this particular Hot Topic is now available online.

Pulse of the Nation
by Mark Day

Mark Day has been "commissioned by HarperCollins Publishers to produce a book on Australia 2000 for publication in mid-1999" drawing together "the Millennium, the Olympics, multiculturalism, reconciliation, the Centenary of Federation and an Australian Republic."

He has "set off to drive around Australia". As he and his travelling companions "explore out-of-the-way places and meet interesting Australians", he will "write about his travels and impressions", and post them to his website.

He "seeks your input". You may care to "comment, add further information, debate conclusions, or contribute ideas for places he should visit or stories he should investigate."

See Day's site for further details.