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John Quick (politician)
Encyclopedia
Sir John Quick Australian politician and author, was the federal Member of Parliament for Bendigo
from 1901 to 1913 and a leading delegate to the constitutional conventions
of the 1890s.
, UK in 1852, the son of John Sr and Mary Quick. The family migrated to Australia in 1854, where John Sr, a farmer, began prospecting at the Bendigo
goldfields. However, he died a few months later.
Quick was educated at a state school in Bendigo and at the age of 10 went to work in an iron foundry
at Long Gully. Quick later worked as an assistant at the Bendigo Evening News, and then as a junior reporter at the Bendigo Independent. Here he gained skills in shorthand
writing, and improved his general education.
In 1873, Quick moved to Melbourne and passed the matriculation
examination at the University of Melbourne
. There he studied law, and with the help of scholarships, completed his course in 1877, graduating with a Bachelor of Laws
(LLB). Quick was called to the bar
in June 1878, but instead continued as a journalist. Soon later, he became the leading parliamentary reporter at The Age
newspaper.
, and was elected the Member for Bendigo in the Legislative Assembly
. He was a supporter of the liberal
leader Sir Graham Berry
. At this time, he resigned from The Age and returned to live in Bendigo, where he practiced as a solicitor.
In 1882, Quick received a Doctor of Laws degree (LL.D) after sitting an examination. In 1883, he married Catherine Harris. The couple did not have any children together.
Quick was successful in parliament, and in 1886 was offered a ministerial portfolio by the then Premier of Victoria Duncan Gillies
. However, after an electoral redistribution
, Quick lost his seat at the 1889 election.
while in the Victorian Parliament, and in the early 1890s successfully persuaded the Australian Natives Association
to advocate federation.
In August 1893, Quick attended the first informal Constitutional Convention at Corowa, and proposed that a formal national convention should be established, with each of the six Australian colonies
to be represented by ten elected delegates. The proposal was agreed on, and in November 1893 Quick drafted a bill
which formed the basis of the deliberations at the formal convention held in Adelaide
in 1897. Quick was elected to the Adelaide convention as second on the list of ten Victorian representatives.
When Federation was inaugurated on 1 January 1901, Quick was knight
ed in recognition of his services to the federation movement. On the same day, Quick and Robert Garran
published The Annotated Constitution of the Australian Commonwealth, which is widely regarded as one of the most authoritative works on the Australian Constitution.
as Member for the Division of Bendigo
. He was considered a member of the Protectionist Party
. He was chairman of the first federal tariff
commission, and was Postmaster-General in the third cabinet under Alfred Deakin
in 1909.
Quick was defeated in the 1913 election
by the Australian Labor Party
candidate, John Arthur
. In 1922, he was appointed deputy president of the federal Arbitration Court, a position he held until his retirement on 25 March 1930.
Quick continued to be a prolific author. In 1904, along with Littleton Groom
, Quick published The Judicial Power of the Commonwealth, and in 1919 published The Legislative Powers of the Commonwealth and the States of Australia. After retiring in 1930, he worked on a book which he intended to call The Book of Australian Authors, a bibliographical survey of various Australian authors, poets and playwrights. However, he died before he could complete the work. Professor E Morris Miller
continued his work, and the book was published in 1940 as Australian Literature from its beginnings to 1935.
In 1913 Quick became the founding President of the first Bendigo Cornish Association.
Division of Bendigo
The Division of Bendigo is an Australian Electoral Division in Victoria. The division was created in 1900 and was one of the original 75 divisions contested at the first federal election. It is named for the city of Bendigo...
from 1901 to 1913 and a leading delegate to the constitutional conventions
Constitutional Convention (Australia)
In Australian history, the term Constitutional Convention refers to four distinct gatherings.-1891 convention:The 1891 Constitutional Convention was held in Sydney in March 1891 to consider a draft Constitution for the proposed federation of the British colonies in Australia and New Zealand. There...
of the 1890s.
Early life
Quick was born in Trevassa, CornwallCornwall
Cornwall is a unitary authority and ceremonial county of England, within the United Kingdom. It is bordered to the north and west by the Celtic Sea, to the south by the English Channel, and to the east by the county of Devon, over the River Tamar. Cornwall has a population of , and covers an area of...
, UK in 1852, the son of John Sr and Mary Quick. The family migrated to Australia in 1854, where John Sr, a farmer, began prospecting at the Bendigo
Bendigo, Victoria
Bendigo is a major regional city in the state of Victoria, Australia, located very close to the geographical centre of the state and approximately north west of the state capital Melbourne. It is the second largest inland city and fourth most populous city in the state. The estimated urban...
goldfields. However, he died a few months later.
Quick was educated at a state school in Bendigo and at the age of 10 went to work in an iron foundry
Foundry
A foundry is a factory that produces metal castings. Metals are cast into shapes by melting them into a liquid, pouring the metal in a mold, and removing the mold material or casting after the metal has solidified as it cools. The most common metals processed are aluminum and cast iron...
at Long Gully. Quick later worked as an assistant at the Bendigo Evening News, and then as a junior reporter at the Bendigo Independent. Here he gained skills in shorthand
Shorthand
Shorthand is an abbreviated symbolic writing method that increases speed or brevity of writing as compared to a normal method of writing a language. The process of writing in shorthand is called stenography, from the Greek stenos and graphē or graphie...
writing, and improved his general education.
In 1873, Quick moved to Melbourne and passed the matriculation
Matriculation
Matriculation, in the broadest sense, means to be registered or added to a list, from the Latin matricula – little list. In Scottish heraldry, for instance, a matriculation is a registration of armorial bearings...
examination at the University of Melbourne
University of Melbourne
The University of Melbourne is a public university located in Melbourne, Victoria. Founded in 1853, it is the second oldest university in Australia and the oldest in Victoria...
. There he studied law, and with the help of scholarships, completed his course in 1877, graduating with a Bachelor of Laws
Bachelor of Laws
The Bachelor of Laws is an undergraduate, or bachelor, degree in law originating in England and offered in most common law countries as the primary law degree...
(LLB). Quick was called to the bar
Bar (law)
Bar in a legal context has three possible meanings: the division of a courtroom between its working and public areas; the process of qualifying to practice law; and the legal profession.-Courtroom division:...
in June 1878, but instead continued as a journalist. Soon later, he became the leading parliamentary reporter at The Age
The Age
The Age is a daily broadsheet newspaper, which has been published in Melbourne, Australia since 1854. Owned and published by Fairfax Media, The Age primarily serves Victoria, but is also available for purchase in Tasmania, the Australian Capital Territory and border regions of South Australia and...
newspaper.
Victorian state politics
In 1880 Quick stood for election to the Parliament of VictoriaParliament of Victoria
The Parliament of Victoria is the bicameral legislature of the Australian state of Victoria. It follows a Westminster-derived parliamentary system and consists of The Queen, represented by the Governor of Victoria; the Legislative Council ; and the Legislative Assembly...
, and was elected the Member for Bendigo in the Legislative Assembly
Victorian Legislative Assembly
The Victorian Legislative Assembly is the lower house of the Parliament of Victoria in Australia. Together with the Victorian Legislative Council, the upper house, it sits in Parliament House in the state capital, Melbourne.-History:...
. He was a supporter of the liberal
Liberal Party of Australia
The Liberal Party of Australia is an Australian political party.Founded a year after the 1943 federal election to replace the United Australia Party, the centre-right Liberal Party typically competes with the centre-left Australian Labor Party for political office...
leader Sir Graham Berry
Graham Berry
Sir Graham Berry KCMG , Australian colonial politician, was the 11th Premier of Victoria. He was one of the most Radical and colourful figures in the politics of colonial Victoria, and made the most determined efforts to break the power of the Victorian Legislative Council, the stronghold of the...
. At this time, he resigned from The Age and returned to live in Bendigo, where he practiced as a solicitor.
In 1882, Quick received a Doctor of Laws degree (LL.D) after sitting an examination. In 1883, he married Catherine Harris. The couple did not have any children together.
Quick was successful in parliament, and in 1886 was offered a ministerial portfolio by the then Premier of Victoria Duncan Gillies
Duncan Gillies
Duncan Gillies , Australian colonial politician, was the 14th Premier of Victoria.Gillies was born at Overnewton near Glasgow, Scotland, where his father had a market garden. He was sent to the high school until he was about 14, when he entered an office in Glasgow...
. However, after an electoral redistribution
Redistricting
Redistricting is the process of drawing United States electoral district boundaries, often in response to population changes determined by the results of the decennial census. In 36 states, the state legislature has primary responsibility for creating a redistricting plan, in many cases subject to...
, Quick lost his seat at the 1889 election.
Federation movement
Quick had become interested in the Australian Federation movementFederation of Australia
The Federation of Australia was the process by which the six separate British self-governing colonies of New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania, Victoria and Western Australia formed one nation...
while in the Victorian Parliament, and in the early 1890s successfully persuaded the Australian Natives Association
Australian Natives Association
The Australian Natives' Association , a mutual society was founded in Melbourne, Australia in April 1871. The Association played a leading role in the movement for Australian federation in the last 20 years of the 19th century. In 1900 it had a membership of 17,000, mainly in Victoria.The ANA...
to advocate federation.
In August 1893, Quick attended the first informal Constitutional Convention at Corowa, and proposed that a formal national convention should be established, with each of the six Australian colonies
States and territories of Australia
The Commonwealth of Australia is a union of six states and various territories. The Australian mainland is made up of five states and three territories, with the sixth state of Tasmania being made up of islands. In addition there are six island territories, known as external territories, and a...
to be represented by ten elected delegates. The proposal was agreed on, and in November 1893 Quick drafted a bill
Bill (proposed law)
A bill is a proposed law under consideration by a legislature. A bill does not become law until it is passed by the legislature and, in most cases, approved by the executive. Once a bill has been enacted into law, it is called an act or a statute....
which formed the basis of the deliberations at the formal convention held in Adelaide
Adelaide
Adelaide is the capital city of South Australia and the fifth-largest city in Australia. Adelaide has an estimated population of more than 1.2 million...
in 1897. Quick was elected to the Adelaide convention as second on the list of ten Victorian representatives.
When Federation was inaugurated on 1 January 1901, Quick was knight
Knight
A knight was a member of a class of lower nobility in the High Middle Ages.By the Late Middle Ages, the rank had become associated with the ideals of chivalry, a code of conduct for the perfect courtly Christian warrior....
ed in recognition of his services to the federation movement. On the same day, Quick and Robert Garran
Robert Garran
Sir Robert Randolph Garran GCMG KC was an Australian lawyer and public servant, an early leading expert in Australian constitutional law, the first employee of the Government of Australia and the first Solicitor-General of Australia...
published The Annotated Constitution of the Australian Commonwealth, which is widely regarded as one of the most authoritative works on the Australian Constitution.
Federal politics
At the federal election of 1901, Quick was elected to the Australian House of RepresentativesAustralian House of Representatives
The House of Representatives is one of the two houses of the Parliament of Australia; it is the lower house; the upper house is the Senate. Members of Parliament serve for terms of approximately three years....
as Member for the Division of Bendigo
Division of Bendigo
The Division of Bendigo is an Australian Electoral Division in Victoria. The division was created in 1900 and was one of the original 75 divisions contested at the first federal election. It is named for the city of Bendigo...
. He was considered a member of the Protectionist Party
Protectionist Party
The Protectionist Party was an Australian political party, formally organised from 1889 until 1909, with policies centred on protectionism. It argued that Australia needed protective tariffs to allow Australian industry to grow and provide employment. It had its greatest strength in Victoria and in...
. He was chairman of the first federal tariff
Tariff
A tariff may be either tax on imports or exports , or a list or schedule of prices for such things as rail service, bus routes, and electrical usage ....
commission, and was Postmaster-General in the third cabinet under Alfred Deakin
Alfred Deakin
Alfred Deakin , Australian politician, was a leader of the movement for Australian federation and later the second Prime Minister of Australia. In the last quarter of the 19th century, Deakin was a major contributor to the establishment of liberal reforms in the colony of Victoria, including the...
in 1909.
Quick was defeated in the 1913 election
Australian federal election, 1913
Federal elections were held in Australia on 31 May 1913. All 75 seats in the House of Representatives, and 18 of the 36 seats in the Senate were up for election. The incumbent Australian Labor Party led by Prime Minister of Australia Andrew Fisher was defeated by the opposition Commonwealth Liberal...
by the Australian Labor Party
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...
candidate, John Arthur
John Arthur (Australian politician)
John Andrew Arthur was an Australian politician and briefly Minister for External Affairs.Arthur was born in Castlemaine, Victoria, son of a goldminer and spent his childhood in several Victorian goldmining towns. He won a state scholarship allowing him to attend Grenville College, Ballarat for...
. In 1922, he was appointed deputy president of the federal Arbitration Court, a position he held until his retirement on 25 March 1930.
Quick continued to be a prolific author. In 1904, along with Littleton Groom
Littleton Groom
Sir Littleton Ernest Groom, KCMG was an Australian Commonwealth Minister, Speaker of the House of Representatives and Australia's 17th longest serving federal Parliamentarian . He was a member of every non-Australian Labor Party ministry from 1905 to 1926...
, Quick published The Judicial Power of the Commonwealth, and in 1919 published The Legislative Powers of the Commonwealth and the States of Australia. After retiring in 1930, he worked on a book which he intended to call The Book of Australian Authors, a bibliographical survey of various Australian authors, poets and playwrights. However, he died before he could complete the work. Professor E Morris Miller
E. Morris Miller
Edmund Morris Miller, CBE was an Australian author.Born in Pietermaritzburg, Natal, Miller moved with his family to Melbourne in 1883. He was educated at University High School and Wesley College. In 1900 he began working at the State Library of Victoria. He enrolled at the University of Melbourne...
continued his work, and the book was published in 1940 as Australian Literature from its beginnings to 1935.
In 1913 Quick became the founding President of the first Bendigo Cornish Association.