Labor's Part in Australian History: A Lament
Abstract
In his Allan Martin Lecture for 2006, John Hirst reflects on his unease with some of the Australian Labor Party traditions. He does not think that Labor parliamentarians should be compelled to vote as caucus directs. He does not think that Billy Hughes and Joseph Lyons were 'rats', or that Labor was right in refusing to join national governments in both world wars. And he believes that the Labor Party's elevation of anti-conscription into a shibboleth was damaging to the party and the nation. In this lecture he laments these and other aspects of Labor's career.