Francis Cotton was an Australian politician.

Born in Adelaide to grocer Richard Cotton and Esther Ann Payne, he was educated privately and worked on a cattle station in Port Lincoln

Port Lincoln, South Australia

- Transport :Port Lincoln is the port for the isolated narrow gauge Eyre Peninsular Railway.There is also a subsidiary port at Proper Bay which may be restored to use for iron ore traffic. The export of iron ore through Port Lincoln has been approved by the South Australian Government. Port...

 before arriving in New South Wales

New South Wales

New South Wales is a state of :Australia, located in the east of the country. It is bordered by Queensland, Victoria and South Australia to the north, south and west respectively. To the east, the state is bordered by the Tasman Sea, which forms part of the Pacific Ocean. New South Wales...

 in 1875. He married Evangeline Mary Geake Lake on 1 January 1883 at Forbes

Forbes, New South Wales

-Notable residents:*Carolyn Simpson - Judge of the Supreme Court of New South Wales; Member of the first all-female bench to sit in an Australian court*NSW Deputy Premier Carmel Tebbutt was born and raised in Forbes....

; they had six children. After working as a shearer, farmer and drover, he moved to Sydney

Sydney

Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...

 to become a journalist in 1889 and was editor of the Democrat, a single tax paper, in 1891; he had founded the Forbes tax reform group in 1887 and joined the Single Tax League

Single Tax League

The Single Tax League was an Australian political party that flourished throughout the 1920s and 30s.Based upon the ideas of Henry George, who argued that all taxes should be abolished, save for a single tax on unimproved land values, the Single Tax League was founded shortly after World War I, and...

 in 1889. In 1890 he represented Wagga Wagga on the Trades and Labor Council, and in 1891 he was elected to the New South Wales Legislative Assembly

New South Wales Legislative Assembly

The Legislative Assembly, or lower house, is one of the two chambers of the Parliament of New South Wales, an Australian state. The other chamber is the Legislative Council. Both the Assembly and Council sit at Parliament House in the state capital, Sydney...

 as the Labor

Australian Labor Party

The Australian Labor Party is an Australian political party. It has been the governing party of the Commonwealth of Australia since the 2007 federal election. Julia Gillard is the party's federal parliamentary leader and Prime Minister of Australia...

 member for Newtown

Electoral district of Newtown

Newtown was an electoral district of the Legislative Assembly in the Australian state of New South Wales, originally created in 1859, and named after and including the Sydney suburb of Newtown. It elected one member from 1859 to 1880, two members from 1880 to 1885, three members from 1885 to 1891...

, serving until 1894. From 1895 to 1901 he was member for Newtown-Camperdown

Electoral district of Newtown-Camperdown

Newtown-Camperdown was an electoral district of the Legislative Assembly in the Australian state of New South Wales, created in 1894 with the division of the multi-member district of Newtown and named after and including the inner Sydney of Camperdown. It was partly replaced by Camperdown in...

, this time for the Free Trade Party

Free Trade Party

The Free Trade Party which was officially known as the Australian Free Trade and Liberal Association, also referred to as the Revenue Tariff Party in some states and renamed the Anti-Socialist Party in 1906, was an Australian political party, formally organised between 1889 and 1909...

. Cotton died in Sydney in 1942.