| This Mere Men article has not been expanded past 1950 yet. |
| Commonwealth of Australia Timeline: Mere Men OTL equivalent: Australia | ||||
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| Capital | Canberra | |||
| Largest city | Sydney | |||
| Official languages | English (de facto) | |||
| Religion | Christianity, irreligious, other | |||
| Demonym | Australian | |||
| Government | Federal parliamentary republic | |||
| - | President | |||
| - | Prime Minister | |||
| Legislature | Parliament | |||
| Independence from the United Kingdom | ||||
| - | Federation | 1 January 1901 | ||
| - | Statute of Westminster adopted | 1946 | ||
| Currency | Australian dollar | |||
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country on the mainland of the Australian continent and surrounding islands.
Australia was populated by the Aboriginal Australians during the last glacial period. The continent was discovered by Europeans and in 1788 the first British colony was formed. By the 19th century, all of Australia was under the control of British self-governing colonies and in 1901 they federated into a united dominion that gradually received more autonomy from the United Kingdom. At the turn of the millenium Australia was the first to remove Queen Margaret as the head of state, signalling the fall of the British monarchy a few years later.
History[]
Australia during the Second World War[]
Australia had declared war on Germany alongside the United Kingdom and France. Australian Prime Minister Robert Menzies of the United Australia Party cooperated with his British counterpart Leopold Amery in organising the war effort, but was reluctant to send Australian men to Europe and Africa and instead pressed for increased defence of Singapore and other British holdings in Asia. Meanwhile, UAP and its coalition partner, the Country Party, narrowly defeated the Australian Labor Party, but lost its majority and was dependent on the support of the independent members of parliament for majority. Menzies repeatedly made offers of a war coalition government to the Leader of the Opposition John Curtin, but Curtin kept refusing until the fall of Port Moresby on Papua to the Japanese. After the Japanese occupied Papua, places in northern and eastern Australia such as Darwin and Brisbane were targets of bombing, which sparked fears of a Japanese invasion. Despite this, on Curtin's urging, the 1943 election was still held and won the UAP-Country coalition and Curtin reluctantly rejoined the war coalition. Australian troops participated in the liberation of southeast Asia and the invasion of Japan.
The war coalition was eventually broken before the 1946 election, which were won by the ALP and Ben Chifley, who had succeeded Curtin after the latter's sudden death, became Prime Minister of Australia. Under Chifley, a record number of laws was passed, mostly related to economic reconstruction and expansion of social welfare. Under Chifley, the Statute of Westminster was finally adopted in 1946 while Australia increasingly expanded cooperation with the United States, which had begun during the war. In 1949, however, the Labor party was narrowly defeated by Menzies' new Liberal Party of Australia, though it retained majority in the Senate and was able to block much of Menzies' proposed legislation. Menzies therefore sought a reason to call a snap election to try and win majority in the Senate for himself, but in 1951, when Labor Party rejected a banking bill proposed by Menzies' government, the Governor-General Herbert Vere Evatt refused to grant Menzies the requested double dissolution election, causing a constitutional crisis after the government won the subsequent vote of no confidence. Because of this, Menzies drafted the necessary documents and requested that King George VI dismisses Evatt. This request was approved and Evatt's successor Alec Douglas-Home ultimately called an early election for early 1952, which resulted in the Liberal Party gaining control of both chambers.