A quick look at the federal referendums as told by graphs in percent states and electors for.
Wikipedia has an excellent section
on the Australian Referendums
with plenty of data. These graphs are built from there. The
Section 128 of the Australian Constitution
states (abbreviated);
The columns marked in green were successful. Note that there were a lot that achieved three out of six states in the for column, but that was not sufficient enough for a majority.
% Electors
Since 1977 the territories count toward the national total for referendums.
The green columns note the successful referendums. An interesting pattern is that many of the referendums hovered just under the fifty percent mark and some over. There are relatively few referendums that had the popular vote and not the state majority, but many of them had high 40s support and no state majority.
What is obvious, is that the referendums which did pass into constitutional change were very popular.
The small number of Australian states can make the results for referendums seem wildly for or against, despite the pattern of the elector's voting to be predominantly be mildly for or mildly against. This makes constitutional change that sparks ambivalence in even a small minority difficult to pass.
These two graphs alone don't answer the question's posed earlier in the article, a closer examination of what the referendum's were, on what topics, and what they represented is needed. I will deal with that in another article.
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This Constitution shall not be altered except in the following manner:-- The proposed law for the alteration thereof must be passed by an absolute majority of each House of the Parliament, ... And if in a majority of the States a majority of the electors voting approve the proposed law, and if a majority of all the electors voting also approve the proposed law, it shall be presented to the Governor-General ...This is sometimes called the triple majority requirement. An absolute majority in parliament, the states and electors. Which is fair enough in a federalist system where it is expected that state electors would be precious of state's rights. One of the questions is, does this triple majority make the constitution too difficult to alter, and is this why the High Court has taken to altering constitutional practice outside of referendums; and why the federal government elicits signed agreeance from the states to allow the federal government to oversee what are state responsibilities rather than constitutionally required federal responsibilities. % States The referendum which allowed the territories to vote did not allow the territories to count toward a state majority in referendums. So throughout federal referendum history, four of six states must pass a referendum.
The columns marked in green were successful. Note that there were a lot that achieved three out of six states in the for column, but that was not sufficient enough for a majority.
% Electors
Since 1977 the territories count toward the national total for referendums.
The green columns note the successful referendums. An interesting pattern is that many of the referendums hovered just under the fifty percent mark and some over. There are relatively few referendums that had the popular vote and not the state majority, but many of them had high 40s support and no state majority.
What is obvious, is that the referendums which did pass into constitutional change were very popular.
The small number of Australian states can make the results for referendums seem wildly for or against, despite the pattern of the elector's voting to be predominantly be mildly for or mildly against. This makes constitutional change that sparks ambivalence in even a small minority difficult to pass.
These two graphs alone don't answer the question's posed earlier in the article, a closer examination of what the referendum's were, on what topics, and what they represented is needed. I will deal with that in another article.
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Comments
* 1946 social services power
* 1967 aborigines included in race power Your comment puts Peter Costello\'s push for a new federalism into its proper light. Nobody would believe it would be successful at referendum, and it is not designed to win the cooperation of the states (under s51.37)