The Australian Oxford dictionary describes the word, egalitarian, as “believing in or based on the principle that all people are equal and deserve equal rights and opportunities'. Throughout history, there have been many factors and events including Life in England, Settlement, Gold Rush, and Federation, which have all played a part in shaping Australia leading up to WW1. Many events prior to World War 1, in time, helped Australia equalize in the eyes of the law.
England has had a significant impact on Australia throughout history, from developing the Industrial Revolution to sending convicts and soldiers to penal colony settlements. If we say that, an egalitarian society is the belief that all people are equal and deserve equal rights and opportunities that would then mean that England could be perceived as an unequal and in some instances unjust society considering the following evidence. It all started in the late 1700s, the Industrial Revolution, which first began in Britain making its way to Europe and America over time. The Industrial Revolution was a time of new inventions, products, changes to working methods, and the introduction of new manufacturing processes. The results of these changes overtime time led to numerous short and long-term consequences. Prior to this event, manufacturing and processing were often done in their own home. They would use hand tools or basic machinery before mass production iron and textile industries installed machines and steam engines that could do the work of hundreds of employees. The Industrial Revolution brought about improved modes of transportation and changes to how people communicated. In addition, industrialization brought about increased volume and variety of products, and the living standard was improved for some. On the other hand, the Industrial Revolution resulted in grim employment statistics and living conditions for the poor and those lowest on the hierarchy. The installation of machinery took the jobs of many people. In addition, the poor working conditions in factories were a major problem at this time. “For the great majority of the laboring class, the results of the policy (or laissez-faire) were inadequate wages, long hours of work under sordid conditions, and the large-scale employment of women and children for tasks which destroy body and soul. Reports from investigating committees on coal mines found male and female children ten or even five years of age harnessed to heavy coal sleds which they dragged crawling on their hands and knees…” (Norton Anthology, p. 3). When Friedrich Engels visited an English industrial city, he stated in “The Conditions of the Working Class in England” that the streets were usually unpaved, filthy, and strewn with refuse due to the lack of gutters and drains. Many people worked in factories, which had very tight spaces, up to twelve people living in a tenement at one time. The new machinery was very unsafe and children were used as labor as they were cheap and could fit in small spaces. Outhouses were unsanitary as they were rarely cleaned which caused a spread of diseases. The employees in these poor cities or slums were either the working class that had to struggle through these unsanitary conditions. “For the first time in history, the living standards of the masses of ordinary people [had] begun to undergo sustained growth…. Nothing remotely like this economic behavior has happened before.” This means that the European Industrial Revolution brought on this change in population in many areas. Unemployment forced people into poverty, resorting to thieving and uniting into gangs. This was known as the Bloody Code because of the huge number of crimes for which the death penalty could be imposed. It would seem as if every crime was punishable by death in the 1800s. Even those that would be considered minor or trivial today, such as stealing a rabbit. “The number of crimes carrying the death penalty in 1688 was 50. By 1815 it was 215!” “This law was also to act as a deterrent”. The government thought that this way, people would refrain from committing crimes, as they knew they would receive a death sentence. Women would ‘do wrong’ to follow their husbands or children on boats to Australia. Crimes such as “cutting down a tree in an orchard or stealing livestock were punishable by transportation”. English convicts were sent to America until 1782 when the American War of Independence ended in 1783. America refused to welcome any convicts into the country so England had to find a solution/elsewhere to send the criminals. Transportation to Australia was the solution. It was the start and cause of migration to Australia.
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In 1788, England claimed the land as terra nullius and Australia was settled. Despite all the changes going on, during this time Australia may have started to gain its equality edge. Soldiers, convicts, and free settlers aboard the First Fleet all received the same amount of rations. A diary entry on the 1st of November 1789 said, “Convict women and men were given the same rations”. Over time, Judges and Juries were reluctant to condemn people to death for such crimes. Transportation was the next best punishment. Transportation was a British legal term, meaning a “prison sentence that was served in exile overseas at a penal colony”. The government chose to transport the convicts to a land far from their home country, with good farming conditions to encourage self-sufficiency. New South Wales was the chosen site to establish a convict settlement. The convicts, free-settlers, and military came on the First Fleet, which consisted of 11 ships that departed from Portsmouth, England on 13 May 1787. There was a hierarchy of different classes and each class was treated the same. The settlers had claimed the land as Terra Nullius, meaning that the “land belonged to nobody” as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders were regarded as flora and fauna. Although somewhere between one-half and one million people inhabited the island. The first contact between Aboriginal Australians and British colonizers in 1788 escalated into the frontier conflict. This conflict lasted for over 140 years and cultural divides continue to split Australia to this day. “In May 1788 a convict was found speared in the bush and a week later two more were murdered. Between 2000 and 2500 Europeans and more than 20,000 Aborigines were killed in conflicts between convicts and Aborigines.” Since the “ghost people” settled in Australia, ignorance of Indigenous people led to many thousands of Aboriginals being killed by white settlers. When the Europeans started to explore the country, they began to take over more of their land and food sources “justifying their actions by saying that Aboriginal people were nomads who could move on and would be just as happy somewhere else”. White people had no regard for their deep spiritual connections with the land and their way of respecting it, which the settlers did not understand. As well as discrimination against Indigenous, the Convict class was also discriminated against in the distribution of land rights and grants. Free immigrants and settlers were regularly given grants of thousands of acres. On the other hand, convicts were given only forty to sixty acres. The reactions of white explorers and colonists to the Indigenous people were often negative. This is the first sign that England did not treat everyone equally at the time of settlement.
The discovery of gold in 1851 led to the Gold Rushes in many parts of Australia and caused an influx of migrants and controversy arose between the migrants and settlers. Most migrants were young men who expected to stay for a few years, make their fortune, and then return home to their families. The Victorian Gold Rush attracted international immigrants from countries including China, Europe, and America. Australia’s population doubled during the first year of the Gold Rushes. “By 1854, more than 2000 Chinese had arrived in the colony of Victoria.” Some people were entitled to dig for more gold than others depending on their ethnicity. Chinese migrants were forced to live under a protectorate system and were required to pay taxes that no other migrants had to pay. It may have been likely that the Government would have considered prohibiting Chinese migration completely if it was not for the 1842 treaty of Nanking (or Nanjing). The Treaty heavily favored the British. The Chinese had to pay a tax (of around $10, 000 in modern-day terms) upon arrival. Under the protectorate system, they were required to pay an additional £1 per year for the privilege. They were also forced to live in designated camps and their business dealings and behaviours were carefully monitored. Evidence proves that the many laws made by the government, discriminated against the Chinese and their rights. Life may have been tough for White Anglo Men in the gold mines however, each person was considered equal - no one person received special privileges, and each individual abided by the same laws. Violence amongst the men erupted regularly due to claim jumping (taking over other people's land), and resolving issues was problematic due to corrupt law enforcement. White Anglo Men traveled to Australia in search of gold and a better life - once word spread about there being gold in Australia, the people started flooding in. Conflict arose which meant schools closed down due to unemployment the harbors were inactive, alcohol was banned on the gold fields to control behavior, and “sly grog shanties” became an issue. The conditions were unhygienic in the Goldfields, making it difficult to control diseases.
South Sea Islanders came to strike it lucky during this time but were not allowed the same etiquette as many others. 62, 000 men, women, and children were deceived into being a cheap source of labor by being offered food, money, land, or a house. In addition, the slaves were cruelly treated and massacred or they received a sentence of five to ten years of slavery under a master.
Equality between men and women was not comparable during this period. “More than 160, 000 women were among the 600, 000 who arrived in Victoria between 1851 and 1860.” Women were required to stoke the fire, bake bread, and clean the house (home duties). Women were often taken advantage of and were not held in the same high regard as men. Women were prohibited from mining in the Goldfields and were often not credited for their actions or their contributions. In some cases, women in desperate need of money, disguised as men and hid their identities to obtain paid employment. Women and children were rarely seen on the gold fields due to such harsh conditions that were considered “inappropriate for women”. The experiences of non-Europeans during the Gold Rush in Victoria were very different from the lives of Europeans. On the other hand, once the Gold Rush and Eureka Rebellion ended, migrants were able to gain employment within Australia. “Thousands of Afghani and Pakistani cameleers played an important role in shaping Australia”. They were required to move goods and supplies from the ports to the Goldfields. They interacted especially well with Aboriginal people. Women and children began to be seen more regularly on the Goldfields as conditions improved. “In January 1853 there were 5,000 women and around 10,000 women by June.” Generally, the Gold Rush sought to see hints of egalitarianism shining through, although Australia was not entirely there yet.
Just fifty years after the beginning of the Australian gold rush, Australia became an independent nation. From a wilderness inhabited by convicts to a free and federated nation in less than half a century. Such a huge shift has rarely been seen anywhere in the world. 'A Nation for a Continent and a Continent for a Nation!' Edmund Barton announces. Australia became an independent nation on 1 January 1901. Before the Federation, Australia was just the name of the continent as a whole which contained six very different states. Each state even had its armies, colonies, and leaders. Federation was the next step towards a more egalitarian society. The suffragist movement was one of those steps during the Federation that helped Australia steer towards equality. Beforehand, once a woman married, all that they owned would be signed to their husband including their children. It was extremely difficult to avoid or escape abusive relationships. In addition, “wealthy mistresses of large manors and estates employed gardeners, workmen and laborers who could vote. However, the women could not regardless of their wealth.” In 1908, another example of lesser significance saw women’s inequality extend to their bathing suits as they were forced to wear swimwear that looked more like dresses than the modern-day garments we wear so freely today. Furthermore, female teachers did not have the same rights as male teachers. In 1915, a ‘set of rules’ was written for Female Teachers, stating women “shall not marry during the term of the contract”, “[they] may not travel beyond the city limits without the permission [from] Chairman of the Board” and “[women] may not dress in bright colors” or “dye [they're] hair”. The suffragists were a group of women who believed they should have equal rights and opportunities. These privileges may include, women having the right to vote and be a part of making laws. Changes made and rights granted changed the lives of many women to this day. The Victorian Women’s Suffrage group held a petition in 1891. It was argued that “all adult persons should have a voice in making the laws which they are required to obey… That, in short, women should vote on equal terms with men…” By the conclusion of the petition, there were more than 11, 600 signatures which were used to be presented to the Government to show both men and women supported women’s right to vote. Victorian women finally gained the right to vote when the 19th Bill passed on 18 November 1908. This event proves that Australia was well on the way to being a society that believes that every individual equally deserves the same rights and opportunities. At this time, changes were being made to support all people.
Henry Bourne Higgins was the president of the Commonwealth Conciliation and Arbitration Court. He founded/proposed the idea of the Harvester Judgement, which led to the beginning of the minimum wage. It was when a Judge decided that the amount a worker is paid is based on reasonable living costs. This idea was established a few years after Federation and Henry Bourne Higgins was deciding the laws the new system would have. A Judge would decide the test of a fair wage would be to meet “the normal needs of the average employee regarded as a human being living in a civilized community”. Another point that was considered was that the pay of a worker should not be determined by the profit made by the employer. “In 1907, the Harvester Judgement set a minimum wage for unskilled laborers of 2 pounds, 2 shillings per week the amount an average worker paid for food, shelter, and clothing – for him and his family.” He began focusing on the Sunshine Factory as it was a large company and had many employees. This was a large step towards a society based upon all being equal or having equity, it was beginning to enable individuals to live comfortably by way of fair and reasonable wages. This law still applies so in turn, enables workers to be given a 'fair go'. This law was not influenced by ethnicity, but was still gender biased, primarily against women.
These were some positive steps towards an egalitarian society, although there was still a significant amount of changes required for society to be equal in the eyes of the law by World War 1. The past acts as a building block for which we continue to reflect and build to bring about positive change.
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