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EspañolBILLY HUGHES
'William Morris 'Billy' Hughes' CH KC (25 September, 1862 – 28 October, 1952), Australian politician, was the seventh Prime Minister of Australia, the longest-serving member of the Australian Parliament, and one of the most colourful figures in Australian political history. Over the course of his 51 year federal parliamentary career, Hughes changed parties five times from Labor to National Labor to Nationalist to Australian to United Australia to Liberal, was expelled from three, and represented four different electorates in two states.
Early years
William Morris Hughes was born in Pimlico, London on 25 September 1862 of Welsh parents. His father William Hughes was Welsh speaking and, according to the 1881 census, born in Holyhead, Anglesey, North Wales in about 1825. He was a deacon of the Particular Baptist Church and by profession a joiner and a carpenter at the House of Lords. His mother was a farmer's daughter from Llansaintffraid, Montgomeryshire and had been in service in London. Jane Morris was thirty seven when she married and William Morris Hughes was her only child. Hughes, William Morris (Billy) (1862 - 1952) After his mother's death when he was seven William Hughes lived with his father's sister in Llandudno, Wales, also spending time with his mother's relatives in rural Montgomeryshire, where he picked up some fluency in Welsh. When he was 14 he returned to London and worked as a pupil teacher. In 1881, when he was 19, William lived with his father and his father's elder sister Mary Hughes at 78 Vauxhall Bridge Road, London.
In October 1884 he migrated to Australia, and worked as a labourer, bush worker and cook. He arrived in Sydney in 1886 and lived in a boarding house in Moore Park and established a common law marriage with his landlady's daughter, Elizabeth Cutts. William Morris Hughes - Australia's Prime Ministers In 1890 they moved to Balmain where he opened a small mixed shop, where he sold political pamphlets, did odd jobs and mended umbrellas. He joined the Socialist League in 1892 and became a street-corner speaker for the Balmain Single Tax League and an organiser with the Australian Workers' Union and may have already joined the newly formed Labor Party.
Group photograph of all Federal Labour Party MPs elected at the inaugural 1901 election, including Chris Watson, Andrew Fisher, Hughes, and Frank Tudor.
Enters Parliament
In 1894, Hughes spent eight months in the central of New South Wales organising for the Amalgamated Shearers' Union and then won the Legislative Assembly seat of Sydney-Lang by 105 votes. Mr William Morris Hughes (1862 - 1952) While in Parliament he became secretary of the Wharf Labourer's Union. In 1900 he founded and became first national president of the Waterside Workers' Union. During this period Hughes studied law, and was admitted as a barrister in 1903. Unlike most Labor men, he was a strong supporter of Federation.
In 1901 Hughes was elected to the first federal Parliament as Labor MP for West Sydney. He opposed the Barton government's proposals for a small professional army and instead advocated compulsory universal training. In 1903, he was admitted to the bar after several years part time study. His wife died in 1906, and his 17-year-old daughter raised his other five children in Sydney. In 1911, he married Mary Campbell.
He was Minister for External Affairs in Chris Watson's first Labor government. He was Attorney-General in Andrew Fisher's three Labor governments in 1908-09, 1910-13 and 1914-15. He was the real political brain of these governments, and it was clear that he wanted to be leader of the Labor Party. But his abrasive manner (his chronic dyspepsia was thought to contribute to his volatile temperament) made his colleagues reluctant to have him as Leader. His on-going feud with King O'Malley, a fellow Labor minister, was a prominent example of his combative style.
Labor Party Prime Minister 1915-16
Following the 1914 federal election, Labor Prime Minister of Australia Andrew Fisher found the strain of leadership during World War I taxing, and faced increasing pressure from the ambitious Hughes, who wanted to introduce conscription, which Fisher opposed. By 1915 his health was suffering, and in October he resigned and was succeeded by Hughes. He was a strong supporter of Australia's participation in World War I, and after a visit to Britain in 1916 he became convinced that conscription was necessary if Australia was to sustain its contribution to the war effort. The vast majority of his party, which included Roman Catholics and Union representatives, were bitterly opposed to this, especially in the wake of what was regarded by many Irish-Australians (most of whom were Roman Catholics) as Britain's excessive response to the Easter Uprising of 1916.
In October Hughes held a plebiscite to try to gain approval for conscription, but the plebiscite was narrowly defeated by the Australian voters.[1] Melbourne's Roman Catholic Archbishop, Daniel Mannix, was his main opponent on the conscription issue. (Although the enabling legislation, the ''Military Service Referendum Act 1916'', referred to it as a referendum that is incorrect as, unlike a referendum, the outcome was advisory only, and was not legally binding). The defeat, however, did not deter Hughes, who continued to vigorously argue in favour of conscription. This produced a deep and bitter split within the Australian community, as well as within the members of his own party.
On September 15, 1916 the NSW executive of the Political Labour League (the Labor Party organisation at the time) expelled Hughes from the Labor Party.[2] When the Federal Parliamentary Labor caucus met on 14 November 1916, lengthy discussions ensued until Hughes walked out with 24 other Labor members and the remaining (43) members of Caucus then passed their motion of no confidence in the leadership, effectively expelling Hughes and the other members.[3]
Nationalist Party Prime Minister 1916-23
Hughes and his followers formed the National Labor Party and negotiated with the Liberal leader, Joseph Cook, to form a new party, the Nationalist Party. At the 1917 federal election Hughes and the Nationalists won a huge electoral victory. At this election Hughes abandoned his working-class seat, and was elected for Bendigo in Victoria. Hughes had promised to resign if his Government did not win the power to conscript. A second plebiscite on conscription was held in December 1917, but was again defeated, this time by a wider margin. Hughes, after receiving a vote of confidence in his leadership by his party, resigned as Prime Minister but, as there were no alternative candidates, the Governor-General, Sir Ronald Munro-Ferguson, immediately re-commissioned him, thus allowing him to remain as Prime Minister while keeping his promise to resign.
Introduction of Preferential Voting for Federal elections
The Hughes Government replaced the first-past-the-post electoral system applying to both houses of the Federal Parliament under the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1903 with a preferential system for the House of Representatives in 1918. That preferential system has essentially applied ever since. A multiple majority-preferential system system was introduced at the 1919 federal election for the Senate, and that remained in force until it was changed to a quota-preferential system of proportional representation in 1948.[4] Those changes were considered to be a response to the emergence of the Country Party, so that the non-Labor vote would not be split, as it would have been under the previous first-past-the-post system.
Hughes attends Paris peace conference
In 1919, Hughes and former Prime Minister Joseph Cook travelled to London to attend the Versailles peace conference. He remained away for 16 months, and signed the Treaty of Versailles on behalf of Australia - the first time Australia had signed an international treaty. At Versailles Hughes demanded heavy reparations from Germany and frequently clashed with President Woodrow Wilson of the United States, who described Hughes as a 'pestiferous varmint'. He succeeded in securing Australian control of Germany's colonial possessions in New Guinea, and was able to insist (along with other Dominion Prime Ministers like Borden and Smuts) that Australia have independent representation within the newly formed League of Nations. Despite the rejection of his conscription policy, Hughes retained his popularity, and in December 1919 his government was comfortably re-elected. At the Treaty negotiations, Hughes was the most prominent opponent of the inclusion of the Japanese racial equality proposal, which as a result of lobbying by him and others was not included in the final Treaty. His position on this issue reflected the modal thought of 'racial categories' during this time. Japan was notably offended by Hughes' position on the issue.
Political eclipse
After 1920 Hughes's political position declined. A new party, the Country Party, was formed, representing farmers who were discontented with the Nationalists' rural policies. In particular Hughes acceptance of a much higher level of tariff protection for Australian industries (that had expanded during the war) and his support for price controls on rural produce. Many conservatives opposed Hughes because they saw him as still a socialist at heart, despite his break with Labor, citing his interest in retaining government ownership of the Commonwealth Shipping Line and the Australian Wireless Company. At the 1922 federal election, Hughes switched from the rural seat of Bendigo to North Sydney, but the Country Party won enough seats in Parliament to be able to demand Hughes's resignation as their price for joining a Nationalist government.
Hughes resigned in February 1923, and was succeeded by his Treasurer, Stanley Bruce. Hughes was furious at this betrayal by his party and nursed his grievance on the back-benches until 1929, when he led a group of back-bench rebels who crossed the floor of the Parliament to bring down the Bruce government. Hughes was expelled from the Nationalist Party, and formed his own party, the Australian Party.[5] In 1931 he buried the hatchet with his former colleagues and joined the new United Australia Party (UAP), under the leadership of Joseph Lyons.
His term as Australian Prime Minister was a record until overtaken by Robert Menzies. He remained Australia's second-longest serving Prime Minister until overtaken by Malcolm Fraser in late February 1983.
Political re-emergence
In 1934 he became Minister for Health and Repatriation in the Lyons government. He was also Minister for the Navy, Minister for Industry and Attorney-General at various times under Lyons and his successor, Robert Menzies, between 1934 and 1941. However, he remained a controversial figure. After 1936 he was a vocal opponent of the British policy of appeasement at a time when this policy enjoyed bi-partisan support. In 1937 he was forced to resign from the government after publishing a book attacking Britain's policies with regard to German rearmament and Japanese actions in China. After the UAP nearly lost the 1940 federal election, Menzies was forced to resign by his colleagues, and in October 1941 Labor came to power under John Curtin. Menzies then resigned as UAP leader, and Hughes, aged 79 and very frail, was elected party leader.
Billy Hughes in 1945 aged 83, seven years before his death
In 1944 Menzies formed a new party, the Liberal Party, and Hughes became a member. His final change of seat was to the new electorate of Bradfield in 1949. He remained a member of Parliament until his death in October 1952. He had been a member of the House of Representatives for 51 years and seven months and including his service in the New South Wales colonial Parliament before that had spent a total of 58 years as a member of parliament. He was the last member of the original Australian Parliament elected in 1901 still in the Parliament when he died. He was not however, the last member of that first Parliament to die - that honour goes to King O'Malley who outlived him by fourteen months. His period of service remains a record in Australia. He was also the last Australian Prime Minister born in Britain.
Hughes died in his home in the Sydney suburb of Lindfield, survived by the six children of his first marriage and by his second wife, but their daughter died in 1937. His state funeral in Sydney was one of the largest Australia has seen: some 450,000 spectators lined the streets. Hughes, a tiny, wiry man with a wizened face and a raspy voice, was an unlikely national leader, but during the First World War he acquired a reputation as a war leader - the troops called him the "Little Digger" - that sustained him for the rest of his life. He is remembered for his outstanding political and diplomatic skills, for his many witty sayings, and for his irrepressible optimism and patriotism. This admiration is not shared by the Labor Party, which still remembers him as a "rat".
Honours
The electoral division of Hughes and the Canberra suburb of Hughes are named after him. In addition, he took his second wife on a long drive in 1911 because he did not have time for a honeymoon and crashed where the Sydney-Melbourne road crossed the Sydney-Melbourne railway north of Albury, leading to the crossing being named after Billy Hughes; it was later replaced by the Billy Hughes Bridge.
See also
★ First Hughes Ministry
★ Second Hughes Ministry
★ Third Hughes Ministry
★ Fourth Hughes Ministry
★ Fifth Hughes Ministry
References
1. Plebiscite results, 28 October 1916
2. The Age 16 Sept 1916
3. Caucus minutes of 14 November 1916 in ''A Documentary History of the Australian Labor Movement 1850-1975'', Brian McKinley, (1979) ISBN 0909081298
4. A brief history of the society and its purpose
5. Election Archive - 1929 election, North Sydney
External links
★ Billy Hughes at the National Film and Sound Archive
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