This channel is about constitutional matters - largely Australian, but sometimes broader international constitutional issues. It is conducted by Anne Twomey, who is a Professor Emerita of the University of Sydney and has both taught and practised in constitutional law and policy for a long time. Some of the videos are directed at education of school students while others concern matters of contemporary discussion or broader public education.
Professor Twomey, After the Federal Court’s ruling that a man can legally be a woman if they choose has raised some interesting legal questions that women never thought would have to be asked. 1. Under Labor's new Dis-information Laws if a woman says that a man is NOT a woman will she be punished. 2. In a Court of Law if a woman says a that man is NOT a woman will she be punished for perjury. That is unless the laws passed by Julia Gillard’s Labor Government are overturned as being unconstitutional. My question is, does the Australian Constitution provide plenary powers to the Parliament to make laws based on personal beliefs to over-rule historically proven factual truths? If not, then are the existing laws on gender self-identification unconstitutional when applied to a non-consenting third party?
Hi Anne, followed you in the news media for many a year. Can you settle this oft-repeated claim once and for all, that the Australian Constitution is invalid because it wasn't signed off by the monarch in 1900 - or have I missed it?
It's worth reading the history of the NSW 'New Guard'. They definitely had some crazy (and dangerous) ideas. Some of them even wore Ku Klux Klan inspired uniforms. Luckily, they were too extreme for most Australians.
Thanks. These are interesting stories. My parents were young at this time, born in the early 20's, but they were "Lang was great" types, absorbed no doubt from my very working class grandparents and their experience growing up through the depression. I used to hear them talk about Lang and his "betrayal", and this puts that in a more detailed context.
My grandfather, as mayor of Mosman at the time, was one of the dignitaries present at the De Groot fracas. His name is also on a plaque at the Balmoral Bather's Pavilion but that has nothing to do with this tale. These "constitutional histories" are really very interesting! Thanks!
That's very interesting! The New Guard (and the Old Guard) were much more serious than I was taught about in high school. "Captain" de Groot's silly stunt on the Bridge and the Centre Party's ridiculous showing in the 1935 election is about all I remember being discussed.
I remember as a child my adored grandfather telling me about 'Captain de Groot' sabotaging the opening of the Sydney Harbour Bridge with his theatrical stunt. My grandfather made it sound amusing, but he left out that de Groot was part of an extreme right-wing group called the 'New Guard'.
Good grief, some folks were certainly rather passionately overly opinionated back in them thar days too, lol, even to the point of seriously plotting the kidnapping of a Premier. Im glad civil society prevailed. Im definitely looking forward to the next chapter of our fascinating Australian political history. And i truly believe our history could even be quite a popular topic if it was ever taught in our schools as it should be, its definitely not boring, lol. Thank you again. 👍🌟
So, according to the AFP, there’s (probably?) no excuse for Australians electing the Abbott government - although, at the time, very few people admitted to doing it. 😂
The leader of the Labor ‘suicide squad’, Alfred Jones, born and raised in Gayndah, was my great-great-uncle. His brother-in-law, Henry Leggett (my great-grandfather) was mayor of Gayndah for 25 years (between the two world wars). After being appointed to the upper house, and successfully leading the vote to abolish the Legislative Council, Alf Jones returned to the Legislative Assembly, and later became a popular Lord Mayor of Brisbane during the 1930s … and probably helped his 17-year-old nephew, Uvedale Leggett (my grandfather), get his first and only full-time job as a draughtsman on the Brisbane City Council. (He retired in 1984 after 48 years in the job.) Shocking his Methodist family, in 1938, young Uvedale (called ‘Joe’) married his Catholic sweetheart, Violet MacMahon (my grandmother), a niece of John Dash, Minister for Transport in the Forgan-Smith state Labor government (1932-42).
"If they kept Lang in jail they would have to feed him, and they can find much better uses for food than that." As reprehensible as at is, even so, the line goes hard. Can this be a movie?
Jack Lang was physically no lightweight. His nickname was 'The Big Fella'. So, it would have taken a lot to feed him if they'd gone ahead with their plans. I think it would make a great Aussie film though.
Thank you for bringing so much of the important and dramatic context surrounding the New Guard, De Groote and the opening of the Sydney Harbour Bridge, which has been missing from so many cursory accounts in TV documentaries and school textbooks.
My father was born in 1932 and grew up on a farm in NW NSW. He died in 2013 and his diaries became available. There’s an entry where he recalls as a child exploring the attic of the family farm homestead and found a large cache of brand new .303 military rifles and boxes of ammunition. Dad’s diary entry goes on to say that when he questioned my grandfather about it, the reply was that it was in case they needed to deal with Lang. Not a proud moment of family history, it must be said. My grandfather was indeed a reserve member of the Light Horse.
Two interesting aspects from these days: 1. The British parliament decided that only Australia would be forced to repay its WWI loans (Bonds equivalent to half of Australia’s GDP) without any reprieve. To paraphrase their response in UK Hansard, the Australians need to be taught a lesson. 2. The second is Sir Phillip Game. After dismissing Lang he returned to Britain where he landed the job of putting together the dirt file on Wallis Simpson, with an emphasis on her drug running and prostitution, as well as monitoring the Windsors for their association with Italian and German fascists, particularly Simpson’s lover Von Rippentrop. Most of his files from this period remain sealed.
UK Hansard has the record. 1931 was an interesting time for Australia, to find out that Britain was entirely indifferent to it, but sympathetic to every other ally and enemy from WWI. They stuck the boot in after WWII too when they agreed with Germany in 1953 that only Australia wouldn’t be paid reparations, something that the Germans completed in 2010, although discounted by more than half. The Game account is drawn from the book, The Duchess of Windsor by Charles Higham.
@@johnfitzpatrick2469 Australia had apparently borrowed heavily from Britain in the early part of the 20th Century. Much of it seemed to be the result of Australia's WWI war debt. Source: UK Parliament Hansard Australian War Debt Volume 251: debated on Wednesday 15 April 1931.
I've found the UK Hansard on Australia's WW1 war debt to Britain. Although I can't find anything confirming that only Australia would be "forced" by the British to repay our debts.
@@mindi2050 It’s a much longer search, the decisions by the British parliament were made on a country by country basis, so Italy, France etc. New Zealand had to repay too, but it was given a trade offset which meant the more it exported to the UK the more it paid off.
Using your sense of “doing the right thing” is not censorship, even though others may have a different on what is right. Your father had sensible views on what should not be on free to air TV.
Most common sense people can see the problem it comes down to who the representative is representing, the party or the people, this is part of the natural progression of legal positivism, where conscience ultimately plays no part.
I’m looking forward to your next video. I remember reading a letter (published in the ‘80s) from the Prince of Wales (soon to be King Edward VIII) to Governor Sir Philip Game shortly after Lang’s dismissal in 1932. Stunning reading! Probably the strongest argument for an Australian republic I’ve seen.
You misunderstand The "Office of Kingship" and the Statute of Westminster Preamble .... Parliamentary Sovereignty gives Parliament no more power than the King had at Magna Carta... .There is, therefore, continuity in the post- Glorious Revolution constitution, where the king’s ministers and servants are accountable for their exercise of powers that were previously the king’s129 - they are no more above the law than the king was himself130. The justices’ reasoning in Miller I - «Otherwise, ministers would be changing (or infringing) the law, which, as just explained, they cannot do»131 - is reminiscent of many of Coke’s reported submissions in court and of his own writings: «the disinheritance of the subject, […] the King by prerogative cannot do; for the King (as it is said in our books) cannot do any wrong»132 and «le Roy fairoit tort qu’il ne poit faire» [the king would do wrong, which he cannot do]133 Rule of Law, Parliamentary Sovereignty and Executive Accountability in English Legal Thinking: The Recent Revival of The King Can Do No Wrong by Professor Marie France-Fortin has 19 published articles on The King and the Crown including this in; 43 Journal of Constitutional History (autum 2022.) The constitutional triad composed of (1) the king’s personal immunity, (2) his ministers’ political accountability before Parliament, and (3) his ministers’ and servants’ legal liability before the courts, was most recently illustrated by two cases of the United Kingdom Supreme Court, Miller I and Miller II . In Miller I, the Supreme Court dealt with the prerogative power to withdraw from treaties and found that the United Kingdom’s withdrawal from the European Union could not be effectuated by the executive alone. In Miller II, the Supreme Court found that the Prime Minister’s advice to the Queen to prorogue Parliament was unreasonable and therefore unlawful, with the effect that the prorogation flowing from that advice was null and of no effect.
Glad you enjoyed it. More recently, I went to visit Henry Kable's grave in cemetery in Windsor, NSW. It was lovely to see where he was buried and feel that connection to the First Fleet.
Premier Jack Lang saw the unelected NSW Upper House as an 'old boys' network' of privileged men appointed for life and out-of-touch with life for most people in NSW - particularly once the depression hit. Jack Lang supported desperately needed social reforms. Some of his ideas seemed radical at the time. He even supported the idea of women in NSW upper house! Unlike Jack Lang, Dudley de Chair was British establishment to the core.
Love your work! This knowledgeableness is so informationaonical its rad to the max to the extreme. Really glad I have subscribed, really enjoying all your videos.
Excellent informative video. I'd read about the crisis that led to Lang's dismissal, but had no idea about this earlier battle with the governor. Nor did I realise that NSW had an unelected upper house back then.
