Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
The Federation of Australia was the process by which the six separate British self-governing colonies of Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, Tasmania, South Australia (which also governed what is now the Northern Territory), and Western Australia agreed to unite and form the Commonwealth of Australia, establishing a system of federalism in ...
The history of Australia from 1901 to 1945 begins with the federation of the six colonies to create the Commonwealth of Australia. The young nation joined Britain in the First World War, suffered through the Great Depression in Australia as part of the global Great Depression and again joined Britain in the Second World War against Nazi Germany in 1939.
The history of Australia is the history of the land and peoples which comprise the Commonwealth of Australia. The modern nation came into existence on 1 January 1901 as a federation of former British colonies .
Since federation, the internal borders have remained mostly stable, except for the creation of some territories with limited self-government: the Northern Territory from South Australia, to govern the vast, sparsely populated centre of the country; the split of the Northern Territory into Central Australia and North Australia, and then the ...
Australia is the sixth oldest surviving federation in the world after the United States (1789), Mexico (1824), Switzerland (1848), Canada (1867), and Brazil (1891). Relatively few changes have been made in terms of the formal (written) constitution since Australian federation occurred; in practice, however, the way the federal system functions ...
However, the council was a weak non-executive, non-legislative federation of Western Australia, Fiji, Queensland, Tasmania and Victoria. The movement for full federation developed in the late 19th century, culminating in the six Australian colonies forming a federation of States. It was envisaged that New Zealand might also join.
The Proclamation Declaring the Establishment of the Commonwealth was a royal proclamation made by Queen Victoria on 17 September 1900 federating the six separate British colonies of New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania, Victoria and Western Australia under the name of the Commonwealth of Australia.
It campaigned for an Australian federation within the British Empire, promoted Australian literature and history, and successfully lobbied for the 26 January to be Australia's national day. [ 51 ] Poet Henry Lawson asked Australians to choose between: "The Old Dead Tree and the Young Tree Green/ The Land that belongs to the lord and the Queen ...