The Politics of the Preamble
by Anne Winckel
Zadok Perspectives Issue No. 64
Winter 1999

Introduction

A few years ago, we were told that many Australians were unaware that our Commonwealth was set up under a Constitution. A few months ago, it seemed that everyone from the Prime Minister to the local butcher was proposing a preamble to precede that Constitution. This is a positive sign for Australia's civic health, since so many school students recognise, or can even quote from, the American Declaration of Independence while not even knowing of the existence of the Australian Constitution.

Anne Winckel
Anne Winckel lectures in Legal Studies at the University of Melbourne. She is currently doing postgraduate research in Constitutional history, focussing on the significance of the Commonwealth preamble.

MANY PEOPLE WERE left speechless when the Prime Minister John Howard passed a (substantially redrafted) new preamble within two days, without any wider public consultation or review or polishing. Was this, we wondered, the way to conclude a national debate on the most significant part of the Constitution to many people?

Certainly, the revised preamble is more inspired in its omissions than its language. What's gone? "Mateship" (and about time), "sovereignty of citizens" (which is a pity), "vast island continent" (and all the Tasmanians cheer), "destiny of our Commonwealth" (which is no great loss), "time immemorial" (well left), "freedom to be proud" (good riddance), "excellence as well as fairness" (an awkward idea well excluded), "equal dignity" (which unfortunately is now replaced with "individual" dignity), "prejudice or fashion or ideology" (oh, thank goodness!), "invoked against achievement" (which was a grammatical nightmare).

Howard's revised preamble now includes: national unity, remembrance of war sacrifice, tolerance, individual dignity, deep kinship with lands (indigenous), nation building (immigrants), responsibility to protect the environment, equality of opportunity for all, national spirit which binds us, adversity and success. The Prime Minister (and of course the Democrats) have also given us much better grammar, phrasing and intelligibility with the deletion of all those excessive "qualifying" statements. "Mateship", thankfully, is gone and environmental responsibility is in.

However, there are still some significant problems. Obviously the green lobby was more convincing than the women's lobby-as women still don't get a mention. And more's the point, "equal sovereignty" and "equal dignity" have now been abandoned, and the only reference to equality is the standard formula of "equal opportunity". Indigenous peoples, however, are still concerned about the absence of reference to custodianship (despite the support of the new clause by Senator Aden Ridgeway). Nevertheless, The Prime Minister's own liberal ideology is still being communicated through words such as "success" and "achievement", and a number of significant recommendations of the Constitutional Convention about the power of the people, are still omitted: responsible or representative government, sovereignty of the people. The reference to the people "committing" to the Constitution is quite a weak and submissive way of saying that we "affirm" the Constitution.

And why, at the eleventh hour, is John Howard adding another "new" thought (which was not part of the Constitutional Convention list of recommendations) in reference to war sacrifices, without leaving time for public debate or discussion? No doubt this is his way of keeping mateship alive without the word having to be used. But the point is, this is our preamble; and any references should be unifying and inspiring, not divisive and ideologically driven.

It is untenable that any draft of the preamble be put to referendum without allowing sufficient time for both community and parliamentary review of the text. It would have been more appropriate to wait until after the Republic Referendum in any case, as then we will know if a new preamble should mention our evolution to a republic.