John Kerr

The Right Honourable Sir John Robert Kerr, AK, GCMG, GCVO, QC (September 24 1914 - April 7 1991), Australian judge and 18th Governor-General of Australia, dismissed the Labor government of Gough Whitlam on 11 November 1975, sparking one of the most significant constitutional crises in Australian history.

Kerr as Governor-General

The Whitlam Government had won a second term in May 1974, but failed to win control of the Senate, where the balance of power was held by two independents. During 1975 the government was enveloped by a series of ministerial scandals (the "Loans Affair"), which resulted in the sacking of two senior ministers, Rex Connor and Deputy Prime Minister, Jim Cairns. The Liberal Opposition Leader (Australia), Malcolm Fraser, decided to use the Senate to block the government's budget bills, thus forcing an early election for the House of Representatives (this is called "blocking supply"). Fraser was able to do this only because a Labor Senator had died, leaving the Senate deadlocked.

Related Topics:
1974 - Senate - 1975 - Loans Affair - Rex Connor - Deputy Prime Minister - Jim Cairns - Opposition Leader (Australia) - Malcolm Fraser - Supply

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By 1975 the office of Governor-General had come to be seen by most as almost entirely ceremonial, and therefore politically unimportant. Nevertheless, the Australian Constitution gave the Governor-General wide-ranging powers, including the power to appoint and dismiss Ministers and to dissolve Parliament. Whitlam and others held the view that the Governor-General had no discretion in the exercise of these powers; that they must always be exercised on the advice of the Prime Minister and never otherwise. Kerr disagreed fundamentally with this view, arguing the Constitution very clearly set out the Governor-General's powers. Constitutional opinion was that the reserve powers remained for use in averting a crisis, but they had yet to be put to the test in Australia.

Related Topics:
1975 - Australian Constitution - Reserve powers

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In a nice irony, Kerr had made study of the reserve powers through his earlier professional relationship with Evatt, a former leader of the Labor Party and High Court judge. Evatt was the author of the standard work on the reserve powers as they applied to the British Dominions, The King and His Dominion Governors (1936). Kerr was familiar with this book, and re-read it before accepting Whitlam's offer of the Governor-Generalship. Kerr took an activist view of the role of Governor-General. Neither temperamentally nor politically was he inclined to accept that the Governor-General was a mere cypher, bound always to act on the Prime Minister's advice. He saw the office of Governor-General as a central player in Australian political life, and so it proved to be.

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