Land Reform in Queensland*

Abstract

QUEENSLAND MAY BE COMPARED with the Pacific states in the western United States, at least in natural conditions and its area of 669,520 square miles. Its area is about equal to the region including the states of Washington, Oregon, Nevada, Arizona and California, together with the Mexican province of Lower California as far as the Equator. The population is far less, of course. Irrigation also is more urgently needed. It is not provided as efficiently as in the irrigation districts of California; the possibilities for agricultural development are about equal. Queensland was made a separate colony in 1859. It was never a convict area, so magistrates and police have not (as in some other states) the taint of origin from gaol governors and warders. This is the only authentic Australian birthstain. The early Parliaments were dominated, as in the modern state of New York, by an endless struggle between the metropolitan area of Brisbane, the capital, with two-fifths of the total population, and the country towns and areas, with a bare but unstable majority. Usually the City vote was called Liberal, or Socialist, and the Rural vote Conservative, or Reform. These were merely labels. As a rule, Brisbane has desired great public services, chiefly in Brisbane, with any losses to be shared by other areas; such a policy has often been described as Labourite or Socialist, but it has little to do with ideology. The first attempt in the British Empire to secure the value of social progress for the Treasury was made by a Queensland * An essay presented to Francis Neilson, Litt.D., on the occasion of his eightieth birthday.