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Parliamentary Handbook of the Commonwealth of Australia

Home | Referendums and Plebiscites | Referendum results 1944

Referendum results

19 August 1944

(19) Post-War Reconstruction and Democratic Rights

Question

Do you approve of the proposed law for the alteration of the Constitution entitled 'Constitution Alteration (Post-War Reconstruction and Democratic Rights) 1944'?

Constitution Alteration (Post-War Reconstruction and Democratic Rights) 1944, the ‘Fourteen Powers’ or ‘Fourteen Points’ Referendum, sought to give the Commonwealth Parliament power, for a period of five years, to legislate with respect to the fourteen specified matters, which included the rehabilitation of ex-servicemen, national health, family allowances and ‘the people of Aboriginal race’ as well as, in some form, many of the matters on which powers to legislate had been sought in 1911 (that is, corporations, trusts, combines and monopolies). There were also to be inserted constitutional guarantees of freedom of speech and religion and safeguards against the abuse of delegated legislative power. All of these proposed alterations were put to voters in the form of one question.

Result
State Number on rolls Ballot papers issued For Against Informal
  %   %
New South Wales 1 758 166 1 694 119 759 211 45.44 911 680 54.56 23 228
Victoria 1 266 662 1 227 571 597 848 49.31 614 487 50.69 15 236
Queensland 633 907 599 568 216 262 36.52 375 862 63.48 7 444
South Australia 403 133 392 443 196 294 50.64 191 317 49.36 4 832
Western Australia 278 722 272 339 140 399 52.25 128 303 47.75 3 637
Tasmania 143 359 139 411 53 386 38.92 83 769 61.08 2 256
Total for Commonwealth 4 483 949 4 325 451* 1 963 400 45.99 2 305 418 54.01 56 633
* Including 417 082 votes by members of the Forces, of which 218 452 were for, 195 148 against and 3482 informal.
Obtained majority in two States and an overall minority of 342 018 votes.
Not carried

 

Referendum results
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