Permalink, The Initial Schism Between Liberal and Labor, cam, 1338 words, 4 comments, Liberal, Labor, Protectionists, Free Traders, Caucus, Alfred Deakin, George Reid, Joseph Cook

The early elections at the federal level were three cornered contests between the NSW free traders, the Victorian protectionists and the first organized political party in Australia: Labor. The NSW and Victorian contingent were not the tightly disciplined parties that we see today, they were more amorphous in the loyalties, but were of similar class, social standing and ideology. The Victorians, led by Alfred Deakin, and Labor, led by Chris Watson, agreed on many common political principles; protectionism, restricted immigration, unemployment benefits and minimum wages. After numerous minority Victorian Protectionist governments, propped up by the support of Labor, finally the Deakinists split with Labor for good. Judith Brett argues that the reason for the schism wasn't policy, but instead principles of party organisation.

Protectionists to Liberals

The early years of the American Republic were dominated by the Virginian Presidents of Washington, Jefferson, Madison and Munroe. They set the tone for what was a Virginian Republic. Australia carries a similar legacy, the Victorians under Deakin dominated Federation and the early years of parliament, achieving a Constitutional Monarchy of limited but not complete independence. NSW was republican and free trade, yet the monarchist and protectionist Victorians set the tone of what Australian government would be. Immigration took seventy years to remove, the protectionist economy eighty years - and we are still working toward making Australia a constitutional republic.

Deakin manoeuvred the NSW Free Traders out of holding government by forming a minority government with Chris Watson's Labor government . Minority government is relatively volatile in a parliamentary system, as shown below. George Reid was Prime Minister, but held government only for a recess period, as soon as parliament convened he was unable maintain his majority.

• William Lyne (Premier NSW) 1901 appointed and unable to form a government
• Edmund Barton (Protectionists) 1901 - 1903 minority
• Alfred Deakin (Protectionists) 1903 - 1904 minority
• Chris Watson (Labor) 1904 - 1904 minority
• George Reid (Free Trade) 1904 - 1905 coalition
• Alfred Deakin (Protectionists) 1905 - 1908 minority
• Andrew Fisher (Labor) 1908 - 1909 minority
• Alfred Deakin (Fusion) 1909 - 1910 coalition
• Andrew Fisher (Labor) 1910 - 1913 majority
• Joseph Cook (Liberal) 1913 - 1914 majority

Joseph Cook is an interesting Prime Minister, and represents the organisational split between Labor and Liberal well.

Joseph Cook Cook was born in Staffordshire in England to a coalminer. Cook left school to work in the pits at age nine, and by age twelve his father died in an industrial accident. Cook supported his family, later becoming a preacher, a railway worker and then a unionist. He married a school teacher who's family had already emigrated to Australia. The Cooks followed soon after, settling in Lithgow. Once settled, he soon became involved in Unionism again, and in 1891 Cook won election in the NSW Legislative Assembly as the Labor member for Lithgow. Two years later he was the leader of the NSW Labor Party.

Labor had grown in electoral popularity as an outgrowth of the Shearer's Strikes in rural Queensland. There workers and unions decided political power lay through the hands of parliament. In Queensland Labor regularly collected more than a quarter of the vote, and was able to claim to having the world's first Labor government in 1899.

In NSW, Labor success was almost instant, with the Labor Party in 1891 winning thirty-five seat and the balance of power in the NSW Assembly. But the inexperienced Labor members were quickly wedged over a fiscal issue which split the free trade and protectionist Labor representatives. The caucus was decimated, and the thirty-five members for Labor was quickly reduced to seventeen.

This led Labor to establish a far more disciplined caucus. Labor believed the only way it could wield power in parliament was by a united front to any opposition through absolute party power. For the Labor representatives there was a conundrum for them, did they represent their electorate, or the labor movement. The caucus took that decision out of their hands at the 1894 Labor Conference which required all Labor candidates and representatives to sign a pledge, "to vote in the house, as a majority of the party, sitting in Caucus, has determined."

Joseph Cook refused to sign the pledge, stating;

.. the pledge destroyed the representative character of a member and abrogated the electoral privilege of a constituency.

Those who signed the pledge returned as Labor members, while the twelve who would not sign, including Cook, returned to the Assembly as Independent Labor representatives. From this point on the Labor Executive only chose candidates who signed the pledge. Cook was not hard done by and became the Postmaster-General in George Reid's Free Trade government.

Joseph Cook in 1909 managed to reconcile the NSW Free Traders with Deakin's Protectionists when they banded together to oppose Labor. Cook led the first Liberal Party Government, and was the Prime Minister at the outbreak of World War I. Cook's other claim to fame was getting the Governor-General to agree to the first double-dissolution election.

Liberal and Labor Sitting in a Tree ... K.I.S.S. Oh Gee

The early governments in Federation were minority ones, led by Alfred Deakin with Labor support. But in 1910 Labor achieved the first majority government, polling nearly 50% of the vote. This left the Protectionists and Free Traders in a bind. Labor was politically disciplined, electorally popular and leaned toward the socialist side of politics. Since the Protectionists and Labor shared many policies, such as economic protectionism, unemployment benefits,minimum wages and restricted immigration, Deakin had hoped that Labor would get absorbed into the Protectionists.

The leader of the Free Traders (and Anti-Socialists), George Reid did not get along with Deakin, and there could be no union between those parties while Reid and Deakin led them. In 1908 Reid retired from federal politics and his able deputy, Joseph Cook took over. At this point the parties combined to form the short-lived Fusion Party, which was then replaced by the Liberal Party.

Traditionally the formation of the Labor, anti-Labor duopoly at this point is looked at in class terms. However Judith Brett argues, that is was not class that caused the Protectionists and Free Traders to set aside their policy differences, but instead party organization. Brett writes;

The insurmountable barrier between the Deakinite Liberals and the Labor Party was not Labor's policies not its attitude toward the state, but the nature of the party's organization: the demands which it made on its members to subordinate their own views and judgements to the collective will of the party and the implications this had for parliamentary government.

The problems Labor's organisation posed for the Liberals was particularly apparent in Labor's hostility to alliances. Labor simply refused to play the parliamentary game as it had hitherto been played, and parliamentary leaders found themselves stalled at every turn as they tried to put together workable majorities in the usual way.

Essentially Labor changed the way politics was done at the State and Federal level. With the establishment of the Liberal Party (as opposed to the Fusion Party), the Liberals, led by Deakin wrote down their party planks. To differentiate themselves from Labor they included a plank which originally said that the Liberals opposed the caucus methods of the Labor Party, but this was changed to one that asserted;

... all representatives of the people should be directly and solely responsible to the people for their votes and actions.

With this statement, it is easy to see why the ascension of Joseph Cook to lead the Free Traders made it easy for them to join in union with the Protectionists. Cook had years earlier left the Labor Party on the same issue. Judith Brett argues that the line the Deakinist Liberals were not prepared to cross, was the one where individuals subordinated their freedom of judgement and integrity of conscience to the iron discipline of the party organisation.

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