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Book Review
| Ross McMullin, So Monstrous a Travesty: Chris Watson and the World's First National Labour Government, Scribe Publications, Melbourne, 2004. pp. vii + 200. $29.95 cloth.
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| This is a book written for a wide audience, and a book that deserves one. Ross McMullin presents a lucid, engaging survey of the Watson government and the early experience of federal Labor in power. An often mentioned but rarely examined Labor government, Watson and his Cabinet are brought to life by McMullin in a way that highlights their importance and should appeal to the general reader and student of labour history alike. |
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The 'world's first' Labor government came to office in April of 1904 and lasted until August of that year. A minority government, it has to some extent performed the role of a footnote in Australian labour history, often mentioned in other works dealing with the period but rarely examined in detail itself. McMullin argues that it deserves greater recognition in its own right. He considers Watson's government to have been sold short by many of Labor's historians, a situation he sets out to rectify. |
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The great strength of this book is in the writing. Escaping the confines of much criticised 'scholarly prose', McMullin presents the story of the Chilean born Australian Prime Minister in page-turning style. In this short book, McMullin draws the reader into the political world of the early 1900s. He makes the reader feel part of the story and his obvious enthusiasm and sympathy for the subject draws you in. The field of contemporary press reportage proves rich for McMullin, and he makes excellent use of quotes from the mainstream press outlining the patronising amusement and indignity expressed by the editorial writers and anti-Labor political figures of the day. The book's title, So Monstrous a Travesty, comes from one such quote from the Maitland Mercury which McMullin argues was a particularly vitriolic, but not unusual example of press reaction to the idea of Labor forming a government. The Daily Telegraph described the Watson government as being a 'curious political freak' (p. 35), and the Sydney Morning Herald argued for an immediate challenge to Labor in parliament, ensuring that 'government by the Labour minority may be rendered impossible from the outset' (p. 39). |
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McMullin presents his history of the Watson government very much within this paradigm of Labor's struggle to assert its legitimacy in the face of overwhelming conservative opposition. He obviously sees Watson and the majority of his Cabinet as having successfully fulfilled the role of displaying Labor's credentials as a 'responsible' alternative to the older anti-Labor parties led by Deakin and Reid. Watson and Labor seized the opportunity to show the Australian people they were fit to govern and to disprove the hysterical views put forward by their political opponents and their supporters in the mainstream press. |
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This argument is presented and sustained convincingly, using McMullin's considerable narrative skill to sweep the reader along with the tide of events. It will certainly appeal to the prejudices of the 'true believers'. This does of course work against a more detailed, complex assessment of the period, but this is perhaps not really McMullin's aim. He has set out to reclaim the Watson government from its position at the periphery of Labor's story and in this relatively short work presents a compelling argument for its place as a vital step on Labor's parliamentary path. |
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McMullin does rather rely on an acceptance that the presentation of a united and respectable front to the outside world was a desirable end in itself for Labor. Those looking for evidence of a more radical Labor tradition will be disappointed here. McMullin portrays Watson's government very much within the Nairn frame of reference. Labor is seen as a responsible 'civiliser' of capital and Watson's greatest contribution as having been to prove that Labor in power would not revolutionise the system, but work within its constraints. He outlines the difficulty faced by Labor in some detail, but doesn't really engage with the complexities of the alternatives offered to them. The desire among significant sections of the broader labour movement of the time for more radical change is not really dealt with in any detail. |
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The sections attempting to link the Watson government's experience to that of more recent Labor governments also leave a bit to be desired. While perhaps part of McMullin's overall push to see Watson's government acknowledged more formally as an integral part of Labor's experience of office, these sections add little to the book and seem somewhat 'tacked on'. The subject matter is more than strong enough to stand on its own and McMullin's entertaining presentation of it doesn't really need the reinforcement of links to the present. |
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Overall though this is a very well written, engaging account of a subject often glossed over in one of Australian labour history's most studied eras. McMullin succeeds in rescuing the memory of Chris Watson and 'the world's first labour government'. It is the sort of book that would be enjoyed by a wide readership of political history and biography, and provides a good entry point for undergraduate students of the period. |
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| University of Newcastle |
SHAWN SHERLOCK | |
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