[Editor: This chapter is part of The White Australia Policy: The Rise and Fall of Australia’s Racial Ideology (2025).]
A British-European policy
The underlying aim of the White Australia Policy was to maintain Australia’s racial composition as predominantly European, by using immigration restriction legislation to block the entry of non-Europeans.
However, there was a particular emphasis on having people of British stock as immigrants, following on from the desire for the vast majority of the Australian population to be from a British racial background, so as to have Australia demographically and culturally aligned with the British Isles and the British family of nations. This was important from the perspective of those who valued being part of the British Empire (a viewpoint which had widespread support in early Australia).
A speech given by Edmund Barton, Australia’s first Prime Minister, at a meeting of the Australian Natives’ Association in 1902, was reported on in The Argus (Melbourne):
“Yet he would thank Mr. Jones for his reference to what the Ministry had done with the help of Australia, to establish the purity of the British race in Australia, or at any rate the purity of the white race in Australia. In this matter, again, there had been a practical unanimity in both Houses of Parliament, which simply reflected a similar unanimity in every state.”[1]
Sir Timothy Coghlan, who was the Agent-General for New South Wales, stationed in London, said in 1908:
“Australians … hold their territory as trustees for the British people in the first instance and for the white races generally, and in this they conceive they have a more noble idea of their Imperial responsibility than have any of their critics who so urgently demand the admission of the Asiatic.”[2]
In his book The Splendid Adventure (1929), Billy Hughes (former Prime Minister of Australia for the Labor Party and the Nationalist Party) wrote:
“Australia, a Western nation seated at the gateway to the East, has a population of little more than six millions thinly scattered over a great continent. The people are remarkably homogeneous; the overwhelming majority are of British stock, and have ideals, traditions, and standards of living vastly different from those of the teeming millions of Asia.
… We believe that the welfare of mankind and the progress of civilisation will be best served if different race-stocks develop along their own lines. And this, broadly speaking, is Australia’s attitude towards migrants from all countries except Britain. If they are of the right type, capable of dissolving into the community and adopting its ideals and standard of living, we welcome them. But Australia is a British community, and its people are convinced that for its security and economic welfare it should remain so.”[3]
A 1931 speech by candidate Tom Collins (who became a Member of Parliament for the Country Party, 1931-1943; and who was Postmaster-General of Australia in 1941) was reported in The Albury Banner and Wodonga Express:
“His objects were above party squabbles. They were 98 per cent. British, and they must keep it so, and regard that as sacred, and stand for a White Australia.
… At present Labor wants to shake hands with the Asiatic races. All other nations had a right on this earth, but their ways were not our ways. Therefore, it is our bounden duty to keep Australia white”.[4]
John Curtin (Labor Party), who was Prime Minister of Australia (1941-1945) during the Second World War (1939-1945), said in 1941:
“this country shall remain for ever the home of the descendants of those people who came here in peace in order to establish in the South Seas an outpost of the British race. Our laws have proclaimed the principle of a White Australia. … We intend to maintain that principle, because we know it to be desirable.”[5]
There were concerns that if Australia had a high non-British component, that could affect Empire loyalty in the country regarding issues of worldwide strategy, especially in terms of economics and defence (for example, if 20% or 50% of Australians were of a German ethnic or racial background, then widespread Australian support for the British Empire would be in question if a war between Britain and Germany were to occur).
Nonetheless, European immigrants were allowed into the country, along with British immigrants (although the latter comprised the vast majority of the immigrant influx). However, the flow of British migration was not moving fast enough for some, who wanted the vast open spaces of Australia to be as populated as possible.
There was a widely-held concept of practical politics that the number of citizens populating a land was closely connected with the right to hold land; or, to put it another way, the level of population was closely connected with the ability to hold land. The peopling of the northern parts of Australia was especially a concern.
The slogan of “populate or perish” gained widespread traction around the end of the Second World War; the idea being that, if Australia had a high population, the nation would have the capacity to fight off an invasion by Japan (or by any other nation). The basic conception of “populate or perish” (in various forms) was espoused for many years prior to the war, but the events of the Second World War gave it a higher importance.
In line with this idea, immigration from continental Europe was increased, with a large influx of European immigrants coming after the end of the Second World War, following the immigration policies promoted by Arthur Calwell (the Labor Party’s Minister for Immigration, 1945-1949). However, Calwell made sure to emphasise to the Australian people that British migrants were still the mainstay of the immigration programme.
References:
[1] “Australian Natives’ Association: Annual luncheon: Speeches by both governors: Mr. Barton and Mr. Reid”, The Argus (Melbourne, Vic.), 28 January 1902, p. 5
[2] “A White Australia: The policy defended: And luminously explained”, The Daily Telegraph (Launceston, Tas.), 28 March 1908, p. 10
Neville Hicks, “Sir Timothy Augustine Coghlan (1855–1926)”, Australian Dictionary of Biography
“Timothy Augustine Coghlan”, Wikipedia
“Agent-General for New South Wales”, Wikipedia
[3] W. M. Hughes, The Splendid Adventure: A Review of Empire Relations Within and Without the Commonwealth of Britannic Nations, Toronto (Ontario, Canada): Doubleday, Doran and Gundy, [1929], pp. 357-358
[4] “Mr. Collins at Walbundrie”, The Albury Banner and Wodonga Express (Albury, NSW), 11 December 1931, p. 3
H. M. Boot, “Thomas Joseph (Tom) Collins (1884–1945)”, Australian Dictionary of Biography
“Thomas Collins (Australian politician)”, Wikipedia
[5] Commonwealth of Australia, “Parliamentary Debates: House of Representatives: Official Hansard”, 1941 no. 51, 16 December 1941, p. 1074 columns 1-2
Geoffrey Serle, “John Curtin (1885–1945)”, Australian Dictionary of Biography
“John Curtin”, Wikipedia
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