Politics, Pageantry and Purpose: The 1920 Tour of Australia by the Prince of Wales

Abstract

Historians have for some time recognised the years during and immediately after the Great War as a watershed in Australian history.1 Before the war the Labor platform advocating a more independent Aus tralia was generally regarded as best reflecting and representing the aspirations of Australian nationalism. The Federal Labor Party lost this position during the war years. At the 1917 election Hughes' 'Win the War' Party persuaded the majority of the electorate that it was the party which could best be relied upon to put Australia's national interests first. The Labor Party was painted as being likely to put class interests before the national interest. It was not the first time that this gibe had been used against Labor. After the 1916 split, however, it became much more of an obstacle for the Party to overcome. The years immediately after the war would decide whether the dominant pre-war philosophy of asserting indi vidual liberty could regain the ascendancy over the now popular view of nationalism as synonymous with responsibility and duty. Through such things as its foreign and tariff policies the National Party Government was able to convince the majority of the electors that it was indeed the nationalist party. The visit by the Prince was a notable step in this process. It demonstrated that those bonds of Empire forged during the war could remain strong in peace. It provided ideological support to the policies of Hughes' Nationalist Party Government. In short, the tour helped set Aus tralia's course towards a closer Imperial relationship when, if it had so desired, greater autonomy could have been won. On a sunny morning in June 1920, Edward Prince of Wales stood on the steps of the Sydney Town Hall and 'met' fifty thousand people.2 For two and a half hours they filed past twelve abreast. Some were too excited to speak, others exclaimed some greeting or other as they went by. The event was repeated in each state capital and always drew large crowds. These democratic levees, as they were called, were one of the more novel events during the highly successful tour of Australia by the Prince, later Edward VIII. Between 26 May and 19 August he visited 110 cities and towns across Australia. He had undertaken a similar tour through Canada the previous year. His father, King George V, described these tours as an opportunity for his son and heir to become better acquainted with the peoples of the Empire. The visits were also regarded as a royal thank-you for the service and sacrifice given by the Dominions in the war. But the tours were also designed to serve another function entirely; that was, to maintain the spirit of Empire. As Geoffrey Serle has described so well,3 the war had prompted many Australians to rethink drastically their ideas of the Empire and Australia's part therein. Her performance in the battlefield and at the conference table suggested that Australia had emerged from the shadow of Britain