John Robert Kerr

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Sir John Robert Kerr AK GCMG GCVO PC (born September 24, 1914 in Balmain , Sydney , † March 24, 1991 in Sydney) was an Australian politician and Governor General of Australia . He became known through the still controversial dismissal of the incumbent Prime Minister Gough Whitlam on November 11, 1975 in the context of the Australian constitutional crisis .

biography

Studies and professional career

The son of a boilermaker from a working-class suburb of Sydney received a scholarship after attending Fort Street High School , which enabled him to study law at the University of Sydney . After completing his Bachelor of Laws (LL.B.) with top marks and a university medal, he was admitted to the New South Wales bar in 1938 . During this time he already met Herbert Vere Evatt , a judge at the High Court of Australia and later Minister, who was his sponsor for many years.

During World War II , he worked for an obscure intelligence organization, the Directorate of Research and Civil Affairs , a fact that later gave rise to many conspiracy theories.

After he resigned from military service in 1946 with the rank of colonel , he became principal of the School of Pacific Administration ( Australian School of Pacific Administration ), which emerged from the directorate. In the following year he took over the office of the first secretary general of the South Pacific Commission , however, he resumed his practice as a lawyer in 1948. As a member of the Australian Labor Party , he subsequently worked in particular as a lawyer for members of trade unions .

Political career and promotion to Chief Justice of New South Wales

In 1951 he initially intended to run as a Labor Party candidate for a member of the House of Representatives , but then withdrew his candidacy in favor of another candidate. After the Labor Party split in 1955, he became increasingly disappointed in the party's politics, particularly because of the leftist tendency of party chairman Evatt . Nevertheless, he did not join the newly founded Democratic Labor Party .

In the 1950s, he was not only one of the leading business lawyers Sydney, but also in 1953. Attorney-General ( Queen's Counsel ). In 1964 he achieved national fame when he was one of the lawyers of the satirical magazine Oz in an obscenity lawsuit alongside the future Prime Minister of New South Wales Neville Wran .

Kerr was first appointed to the Commonwealth Industrial Court in 1966 and later to other courts. During this time, his political views became increasingly conservative , especially after its accession to the Congress for Cultural Freedom ( Association for Cultural Freedom ), a conservative group that completely from the Central Intelligence Agency was controlled (CIA). There he made friends with the President of the High Court of Australia . From 1966 to 1970 he was also the first chairman of the Law Association for Asia and the West Pacific .

In 1972 he was appointed President ( Chief Justice ) of the Supreme Court of New South Wales.

Governor General of Australia

Appointments, inauguration and affairs in the Whitlam government

After the resignation of Governor General Sir Paul Hasluck in July 1974 Prime Minister and Chairman of the Labor Party Gough Whitlam offered him this office. Although he did not know the prime minister very well, he found him politically reliable because of his previous membership in the Labor Party. Whitlam, however, overlooked Kerr's change of political opinion and his divergent understanding of the office of governor-general. After being appointed by Queen Elizabeth II , he officially assumed the office of 18th Governor General after he was sworn in on July 11, 1974.

Despite Whitlam's re-election as prime minister in May 1974, the Labor Party did not have a majority in the Senate , which led to political conflict, as two independent senators tipped the scales with the majority . Throughout 1975 the Whitlam government was embroiled in a number of ministerial scandals, with the Khemlani Loans affair in particular leading to the resignation of Deputy Prime Minister Jim Cairns and Minister of Natural Resources and Energy Rex Connor.

The leader of the liberal opposition , Malcolm Fraser , used the Senate to block the draft budget in order to get early elections. Fraser accomplished this by replacing two Labor Senators with the appointment of two independent candidates by the Prime Ministers of New South Wales and Queensland who did not support the incumbent Whitlam government. This highly controversial and unprecedented procedure broke for the first time with the constitutional custom that a departing Senator should be replaced by a successor of the respective party. The previous practice was determined in a subsequent constitutional referendum.

Kerr and Whitlam's Views on the Role of the Governor General

The office of governor general was seen by most as largely representative at the time. Nonetheless, the Australian Constitution gave the Governor General extensive, uncontrollable powers (so-called reserve powers), including the appointment and dismissal of ministers and the dissolution of parliament.

Whitlam, along with others, believed that the Governor General had no discretion in the exercise of this power and that it could only be exercised on the advice of the Prime Minister and never vice versa.

Kerr saw it radically differently, pointing out that the constitution made the governor-general's powers very clear. In this view he saw himself strengthened by the standard work "The King and His Dominion Governors" from 1936, in which his old patron Herbert Evatt represented the institution of the Reserve Powers in the British Dominions . Kerr took an active and most unusual consideration of the role of the governor general.

Constitutional crisis in 1975

see main article Australian Constitutional Crisis of 1975
Since the opposition Liberal Party, led by Malcolm Fraser , was able to reject government laws with a majority in the Senate, governing the country was made more difficult because, among other things, the budget was part of it. Kerr initially tried to work out compromises between Fraser and Whitlam, but when these were not accepted, he dismissed Whitlam and appointed Fraser Prime Minister. Fraser called new elections.

Although Kerr gave detailed reasons for his position and the dismissal, both the impeachment of Whitlam and the authorization to dissolve both parliamentary chambers are classified as highly questionable under constitutional law to this day . Such a procedure had never existed before or after. The motives that prompted the Governor-General to take this approach are still unclear because of the different portrayals of the people involved. Kerr tried to justify himself in particular in an autobiography in which he also dealt with the accusation of alcoholism raised against him .

In the remainder of his term in office, he made only three trips abroad. During her state visit to Australia in March 1977, he proposed to Queen Elizabeth II that he resign. Due to an increasing deterioration in his health, he officially resigned before the end of his five-year term on December 8, 1977 and was replaced as Governor General by the respected legal scholar Sir Zelman Cowen .

He turned down the post of ambassador to UNESCO , which Prime Minister Fraser had offered him instead, due to enormous public pressure. In particular, William George Hayden , Whitlam's successor as chairman of the Australian Labor Party and opposition leader and later Governor General of Australia, remarked in a speech in the House of Representatives: "The Appointment of Sir John Kerr as Ambassador ... is not just an indecent exercise of the rankest cynicism. It is in every respect an affront to this country " . (The appointment of Sir John Kerr as ambassador ... is not just an indecent exercise of the strongest cynicism. It is an affront to this country in every way.)

After leaving the office of Governor General, Kerr lived mostly in Europe until shortly before his death in Sydney .

Honorary positions and awards

During his professional career as a lawyer and judge, he held several honorary positions, including President of the Australian Industrial Relations Society from 1960 to 1963, President of the New South Wales Bar Association in 1963, and President of the Council of Laws from 1965 to 1966 (Law Council) of Australia.

In addition, he has received several awards and was, among other things, Knight of the Order of Australia and Knight Grand Cross of the Order of St. Michael and St. George and the Royal Victorian Order in 1976 . In 1977 he was appointed to the Privy Council , a political advisory body to Queen Elizabeth II.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Kerr, John Robert: Matters of Judgment: An Autobiography , 1979, ISBN 978-0-312-52305-3
  2. ↑ Biography on the homepage of the Supreme Court of the Northern Territory ( Memento of the original from September 12, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.nt.gov.au

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Kerr, John Robert
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Australian politician, Governor General of Australia
DATE OF BIRTH September 24, 1914
PLACE OF BIRTH Balmain, New South Wales , Sydney, Australia
DATE OF DEATH March 24, 1991
Place of death Sydney