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Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act, 1900
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General SummaryThis is the blueprint of the Commonwealth, setting out how the new federation would be established and the guidelines for the way Australians would shape their nation. The Constitution is also the blueprint for the lives of Australians, providing the authority for the powers by which our legislators make laws, our executive government implements them, and our courts operate.
The Act begins with nine clauses of the British Act; and the remainder is the 128 Sections of the original Australian Constitution. These Sections are divided into eight chapters – their headings show what is needed to create a new constitutional democracy as a federation, with a monarch as Head of State. The Constitution establishes three "arms" of government: the Parliament (Chapter I), the Executive (Chapter II), and the Judiciary (Chapter III). It covers financial and trade matters (Chapter IV); the federal relationship between the States and the Commonwealth including the formation of new States (Chapters V and VI); the arrangements for a Seat of Government (Chapter VII) and the process for any alteration of the Constitution (Chapter VIII).
This document is inseparable from the Royal Commission of Assent, with which it became law; the 100th birthday of the Australian Constitution is 9 July 2000, the date of the Assent.
The original Constitution has been amended eight times, in 1907 (S.13), 1910 (S.105), 1929 (S.105), 1946 (S.51), 1967 (S.51, S.127), and three amendments in 1977 (S.15, S.72, S.128).
An Act to Constitute the Commonwealth of Australia [9th July 1900]
Whereas the people of New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, Queensland, and Tasmania, humbly relying on the blessing of Almighty God, have agreed to unite in one indissoluble Federal Commonwealth under the Crown of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, and under the Constitution hereby established:
And whereas it is expedient to provide for the admission into the Commonwealth of other Australasian Colonies and possessions of the Queen:
Be it therefore enacted by the Queen’s most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:-
1. This Act may be cited as the Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act.
2. The provisions of this Act referring to the Queen shall extend to Her Majesty’s heirs and successors in the sovereignty of the United Kingdom.
3. It shall be lawful for the Queen, with the advice of the Privy Council, to declare by proclamation that, on and after a day therein appointed, not being later that one year after the passing of this Act, the people of New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, Queensland and Tasmania, and also, if Her Majesty is satisfied that the people of Western Australia have agreed thereto, of Western Australia, shall be united in a Federal Commonwealth under the name of the Commonwealth of Australia. But the Queen may, at any time after the proclamation, appoint a Governor-General for the Commonwealth.
4. The Commonwealth shall be established, and the Constitution of the Commonwealth shall take effect, on and after the day so appointed. But the Parliaments of the several colonies may at any time after the passing of this Act make any such laws, to come into operation on the day so appointed, as they might have made of the Constitution had taken effect at the passing of this Act.
5. This Act, and all laws made by the Parliament of the Commonwealth under the Constitution, shall be binding on the courts, judges, and people of every State and of every part of the Commonwealth, notwithstanding anything in the laws of any State; and the laws of the Commonwealth shall be in force on all British ships, the Queen’s ships of war excepted, whose first port of clearance and whose port of destination are in the Commonwealth.
6. "The Commonwealth" shall mean the Commonwealth of Australia as established under this Act.
"The States" shall mean such of the colonies of New South Wales, New Zealand, Queensland, Tasmania, Victoria, Western Australia, and South Australia, including the northern territory of South Australia, as for the time being are parts of the Commonwealth, and such colonies or territories as may be admitted into or established by the Commonwealth as States; and each of such parts of the Commonwealth shall be called "a State".
"Original States" shall mean such States as are parts of the Commonwealth at its establishment.
7. The Federal Council of Australasia Act, 1885, is hereby repealed, but so as not to affect any laws passed by the Federal Council of Australasia and in force at the establishment of the Commonwealth.
Any such law may be repealed as to any State by the Parliament of the Commonwealth, or as to any colony not being a State by the Parliament thereof.
8. After the passing of this Act the Colonial Boundaries Act, 1895, shall not apply to any colony which becomes a State of the Commonwealth; but the Commonwealth shall be taken to be a self-governing colony for the purposes of that Act.
9. The Constitution of the Commonwealth shall be as follows:-
Contents:
Chicago: Lenore Coltheart, ed., "An Act to Constitute the Commonwealth of Australia [9th July 1900]," Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act, 1900 in Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act, 1900 (Canberra, Australia: National Archives of Australia, Commonwealth of Australia, 2000), Original Sources, accessed November 23, 2024, http://originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=AZLPTGR2U4W6PA1.
MLA: . "An Act to Constitute the Commonwealth of Australia [9th July 1900]." Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act, 1900, edited by Lenore Coltheart, in Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act, 1900, Canberra, Australia, National Archives of Australia, Commonwealth of Australia, 2000, Original Sources. 23 Nov. 2024. http://originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=AZLPTGR2U4W6PA1.
Harvard: (ed.), 'An Act to Constitute the Commonwealth of Australia [9th July 1900]' in Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act, 1900. cited in 2000, Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act, 1900, National Archives of Australia, Commonwealth of Australia, Canberra, Australia. Original Sources, retrieved 23 November 2024, from http://originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=AZLPTGR2U4W6PA1.
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