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Abstract
Through his role in the early United Nations, Herbert Vere Evatt is often credited with having advanced the cause of international human rights. But in 1951, Evatt articulated an alternative understanding of the roots of liberty, one centred on the role of British justice in checking ‘tyranny’ and ‘totalitarianism’. This neo-Roman conception of freedom had long competed in Evatt's thought with a belief in the need for an unfettered executive to achieve desirable social and economic goals. Although inconsistent in defence of liberty across his career, Evatt succeeded in this campaign because his case harmonised with contemporary understandings of freedom and its enemies in a post-war British-Australian community.
Notes
*My thanks to Joy Damousi, Ann Curthoys and Ann Genovese for their advice.
1George Williams, ‘The Suppression of Communism by Force of Law: Australia in the Early 1950s’, Australian Journal of Politics and History 42, no. 2 (April 1996): 220–40; Michael Kirby, ‘H V Evatt, the Anti-Communist Referendum and Liberty in Australia’, Australian Bar Review 7, no. 2 (March 1991): 93–120.
4 Commonwealth Parliamentary Debates (CPD), 213, 10 July 1951, 1222.
2Roderick Meagher, ‘Evatt and Civil Liberties’, in Seeing Red: The Communist Party Dissolution Act and Referendum 1951: Lessons for Constitutional Reform, ed. Elsa Atkin and Brett Evans (Sydney: Evatt Foundation, 1992), 179–86; Robert Murray, ‘Looking Back on Evatt and the Split’, Quadrant 48, no. 10 (October 2004): 20–5; Andrew Campbell, ‘Dr H.V. Evatt—Part One: A Question of Sanity’, National Observer 73 (Winter 2007): 25–39, and ‘Dr H.V. Evatt—Part II: The Question of Loyalty’, National Observer 76 (Autumn 2008): 33–55. For a comment on the madness claim, see Frank Bongiorno, ‘Personality Splits? (50 Years after Labor's Great Split)’, Seeing Red 5 (March 2006): 25–7.
3Geoffrey Robertson, ‘Introduction’ to Herbert Vere Evatt, The Tolpuddle Martyrs: Injustice within the Law (Sydney: Sydney University Press, 2009), vii–xix; and Ashley Hogan, Moving in the Open Daylight: Doc Evatt, an Australian at the United Nations (Sydney: Sydney University Press, 2008).
5John Hirst, ‘From British Rights to Human Rights’, Quadrant 48, no. 3 (March 2004): 14–15.
6Ian Hancock, National and Permanent? The Federal Organisation of the Liberal Party of Australia 1944–1965 (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 2000), 97–9; David Lowe, Australian between Empires: The Life of Percy Spender (London: Pickering & Chatto, 2010), 114, 128.
7A. W. Martin, ‘Mr Menzies’ Anticommunism’, Quadrant 40, no. 5 (May 1996): 47–56.
8David Lowe, Menzies and the ‘Great World Struggle’: Australia's Cold War, 1948–1954 (Sydney: University of New South Wales Press, 1999), ch. 5, and ‘Menzies’ National Security State, 1950–53’, in Menzies in War and Peace, ed. Frank Cain (Sydney: Allen & Unwin in association with the Australian Defence Studies Centre, Australian Defence Force Academy, 1997), ch. 3; L. J. Louis, Menzies’ Cold War: A Reinterpretation (Melbourne: Red Rag Publications, 2001), esp. ch. 5, and ‘Conspiracies and Threats to Democracy: The Other Side of the Coin’, in Arguing the Cold War, ed. Peter Love and Paul Strangio (Melbourne: Red Rag Publications, 2001), 37–45; David Lee, ‘The National Security Planning and Defence Preparations of the Menzies Government, 1950–1953’, War & Society 10, no. 2 (October 1992): 119–38.
9There is a copy of the Act in appendix II in Leicester Webb, Communism and Democracy in Australia: A Survey of the 1951 Referendum (Melbourne: F. W. Cheshire, 1954), 186–95. For analysis of the legislation, see Jenny Hocking, ‘Robert Menzies’ “Fundamental Authoritarianism”: The 1951 Referendum’, in Love and Strangio, 47–59; and George Winterton, ‘Dissolving the Communists: The Communist Party Case and Its Significance’, in Atkin and Evans, 141–57.
10Les Louis, ‘“Operation Alien” and the Cold War in Australia 1950–1953’, Labour History 62 (May 1992): 1–18; ‘Pig Iron Bob Finds a Further Use for Scrap Iron: Barbed Wire for His Cold War Concentration Camps’, Hummer 35 (January–June 1993): 1–6; and ‘Communism as a Hanging Offence in the Cold War in Australia, 1950–1953’, Journal of Australian Studies 46 (September 1995): 11–19.
11Neville Meaney, ‘Britishness and Australian Identity: The Problem of Nationalism in Australian History and Historiography’, Australian Historical Studies 32, no. 116 (April 2001): 76–90; Stuart Ward, Australia and the British Embrace: The Demise of the Imperial Ideal (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 2001); Deryck M. Schreuder and Stuart Ward, eds, Australia's Empire (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008). A valuable account of a Labor understanding of Britishness, examined through the evolution of John Curtin's thinking, is James Curran, Curtin's Empire (Melbourne: Cambridge University Press, 2011).
12For Evatt's liberalism, see Peter Beilharz, ‘The Young Evatt—Labor's New Liberal’, Australian Journal of Politics and History 39, no. 2 (1993): 160–70.
13See, especially, Meagher.
14H. V. Evatt, Liberalism in Australia: An Historical Sketch of Australian Politics down to the Year 1915 (Sydney: The Law Book Co. of Australasia, 1918), 5.
15Herbert Vere Evatt, Rum Rebellion: A Study of the Overthrow of Governor Bligh by John Macarthur and the New South Wales Corps (Sydney: Angus & Robertson, 1938), 164.
16Evatt, Liberalism, 6.
17Leslie Zines, ‘Mr Justice Evatt and the Constitution’, Federal Law Review 3 (1968–9): 153–86; Scott Guy, ‘Herbert Vere Evatt: Jurist, Politician, Person—the Paradox’, Bond Law Review 21, Issue 1, Article 4 (2009), http://epublications.bond.edu.au/blr/vol21/iss1/4
18H. V. Evatt, The Royal Prerogative (Sydney: The Law Book Company, 1987 [1924]). For a discussion, see Frank Bongiorno, ‘Commonwealthmen and Republicans: Dr. H.V. Evatt, the Monarchy and India’, Australian Journal of Politics and History 46, no. 1 (March 2000): 38–40.
19 King v Hush; Ex Parte Devanny (1932), Commonwealth Law Reports (1932–3), 510–19.
20Herbert Vere Evatt, The King and His Dominion Governors: A Study of the Reserve Powers of the Crown in Great Britain and the Dominions (London: Frank Cass & Co, 1967 [1936]), 277.
21 Post-war Reconstruction: A Case for Greater Commonwealth Powers (Canberra: L. F. Johnston, Commonwealth Government Printer, 1942), 108, 77–8, 107, 120.
22Kylie Tennant, Evatt: Politics and Justice (Sydney: Angus & Robertson, 1970), 260–1; Peter Crockett, Evatt: A Life (Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1993), 163–4, 340 (n. 41); Ken Buckley, Barbara Dale and Wayne Reynolds, Doc Evatt: Patriot, Internationalist, Fighter and Scholar (Melbourne: Longman Cheshire, 1994), 359.
23Evatt to J. P. Toohey, 10 October 1951, CPA Referendum 1951 Correspondence, Evatt Collection (hereafter Evatt Collection), Flinders University, Adelaide.
24Webb, 129, 133.
25 Sun (Sydney), 20 September 1951, Referendum on Communism, 1951, Scrapbook (hereafter Scrapbook), 168, Evatt Collection.
26Webb, 187.
27 Sydney Morning Herald (hereafter SMH), 24 September 1951, Scrapbook, 235, Evatt Collection, Flinders University.
28 Sunday Herald, 16 September 1951, in Scrapbook, 120.
29 Age, 19 September 1951, in Scrapbook, 163.
30 Sunday Telegraph, 16 September 1951, in Scrapbook, 119.
31 Sunday Herald, 16 September 1951, in Scrapbook, 120.
32 SMH, 17 August 1951, in Scrapbook, 3.
33 Age, 22 August 1951, and Daily Telegraph, 22 August 1951, in Scrapbook, 15, 21.
34 Sun (Sydney), 24 August 1951, in Scrapbook, 25.
35 Age, 12 September 1951, in Scrapbook, 86.
36 SMH, 14 September 1951, in Scrapbook, 109.
37 SMH, 20 September 1951, in Scrapbook, 178.
38Kirby, 98–9.
39 CPD, 213, 5 July 1951, 1078–9.
40Herbert Vere Evatt, Injustice within the Law: A Study of the Case of the Dorsetshire Labourers (Sydney: The Law Book Co. of Australasia, 1937).
41 Daily Telegraph, 17 August 1951, and Mirror, 17 August 1951, Scrapbook, 10, Evatt Collection.
42 Age, 17 September 1951, in Scrapbook, 122.
43The official Yes and No cases appear as appendix I in Webb, 178–85. The quotation from Jowitt is at 183.
44Jowitt to Evatt, 22 August 1951, Correspondence Miscellaneous 1951, Evatt Collection.
45 SMH, 5 September 1951, Scrapbook, 45, Evatt Collection.
46Kirby, 110.
47Hirst, 14–15.
48 Sun (Sydney), 21 September 1951, Scrapbook, 189, Evatt Collection.
49D. H. Hunt to Evatt, 7 October 1951, Correspondence Miscellaneous 1951, Evatt Collection.
50Some conservative Catholic members of the Victorian branch of the Labor Party were antagonistic towards the No case. There was isolated opposition in other corners of the party, such as from the Labor member for Adelaide, Cyril Chambers, also a Catholic, who refused to campaign for a No vote. The premier of Tasmania, Robert Cosgrove, was notably aloof.
51H. Brisbane to Evatt, 24 September 1951, Correspondence: Congratulations on Leadership of Party 1951, Folder 1/92, Evatt Collection.
52 Herald (Melbourne), 21 September 1951, and Sun (Sydney), 21 September 1951, Scrapbook, 188–9, Evatt Collection.
56‘Dr Evatt's Referendum Broadcast’, 5 September 1951, 3, CPA Referendum 1951 Statements, Speakers Notes etc., Evatt Collection.
53Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism (New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1951), 433.
54Simon Tormey, Making Sense of Tyranny: Interpretations of Totalitarianism (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1995), esp. 1–7.
55 Age, 22 August 1951, and Sun (Sydney), 20 September 1951, Scrapbook, 15 and 171, Evatt Collection.
57Webb, 62, 64.
58John Murphy, Imagining the Fifties: Private Sentiment and Political Culture in Menzies’ Australia (Sydney: University of New South Wales Press/Pluto Press, 2000), 99.
59Webb, 63.
60 Herald (Melbourne), 20 September 1951, 4.
61 Sunday Herald, 16 September 1951, Scrapbook, 120, Evatt Collection.
62Kirby, 116.
63Quoted in Webb, 67.
64Judith Brett, Robert Menzies’ Forgotten People (Sydney: Macmillan, 1992), 92–108.
67‘Dr Evatt's Referendum Broadcast’, 5 September 1951, 3, CPA Referendum 1951 Statements, Speakers Notes etc., Evatt Collection.
65Bongiorno, ‘Commonwealthmen and Republicans’.
66Quentin Skinner, Liberty before Liberalism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 50–1, 69.
68 Sun (Sydney), 19 September 1951, Scrapbook, 164, Evatt Collection.
69 Telegraph (Brisbane), 14 September 1951, in Scrapbook, 349.
70 Sun (Sydney), 13 September 1951, in Scrapbook, 93, 95.
71 Sun (Sydney), 20 September 1951, in Scrapbook, 171.
72 Daily Telegraph, 20 September 1951, in Scrapbook, 172.
73 Sunday Herald, 16 September 1951, in Scrapbook, 120.
74 The Times, 25 September 1951, in Scrapbook, 213.
75 SMH, 19 September 1951, in Scrapbook, 157.
76 Post-war Reconstruction, 80, 79, 78.
77 SMH, 24 September 1951, Scrapbook, 235, Evatt Collection; Webb, 55.
78Alan Reid, interview with Toby Miller, 5 March 1980, 1/2/23, ORAL TRC 734, National Library of Australia, Canberra.
79Geoffrey Robertson, Statute of Liberty: How Australians Can Take Back Their Rights (Sydney: Vintage Books, 2009), 29.
80Ann Curthoys, Freedom Ride: A Freedom Rider Remembers (Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 2002); Jennifer Clark, Aborigines and Activism: Race, Aborigines and the Coming of the Sixties to Australia (Perth: University of Western Australia Press, 2008); Ravi de Costa, A Higher Authority: Indigenous Transnationalism and Australia (Sydney: University of New South Wales Press, 2006); Bain Attwood, Rights for Aborigines (Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 2003).
81De Costa, Higher Authority, 7; Hilary Charlesworth, Writing in Rights: Australia and the Protection of Human Rights (Sydney: University of New South Wales Press, 2002), 64–5; Robertson, Statute of Liberty, 150.
82De Costa, Higher Authority, 91.
83Bain Attwood and Andrew Markus, Thinking Black: William Cooper and the Australian Aborigines’ League (Canberra: Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies, 2004); Ravi de Costa, ‘Identity, Authority, and the Moral Worlds of Indigenous Petitions’, Comparative Studies in Society and History 48, no. 3 (2006): 669–98.
84Charlesworth, 62–4.