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Australian Events

Posted in 1903

  • Deakin Government, September 24 (see Australian Prime Ministers)
  • Australia is the first nation to give women both the right to vote and the right to stand for parliament.
  • The High Court of Australia is established. The first sitting took place in the Banco Court of the Supreme Court building in Melbourne on 6 October. The Bench comprised three distinguished people who had been prominent in the Federal movement. They were The Chief Justice, Sir Samuel Griffith, Sir Edmund Barton and Richard Edward O'Connor.
  • Billy Hughes launches a ferocious attack in parliament on the protectionist policies of PM Alfred Deakin. The protectionists believe that tariffs protect Australian jobs and products against cheap imports, encourage secondary industries and provide a means to ensure that the benefits of Australia's world-competitive industries go to the population as a whole.
    The Age, 9 May 2001.