HOW MENZIES MAINTAINED HIS ASCENDENCY – ZACHARY GORMAN

In 2025, the Robert Menzies Institute published the third volume in its Menzies series – titled The Menzies Ascendency – Fortune, Stability, Progress 1954–1961. The Sydney launch took place at The Sydney Institute on Monday 3 February. The book was launched by former High Court judge The Hon Michael Kirby and The Australian’s Paul Kelly. They were introduced by Robert Menzies Institute director Georgina Downer, with follow up speeches by editor Zachary Gorman and contributor to the volume Anne Henderson.

HOW MENZIES MAINTAINED HIS ASCENDENCY 

ZACHARY GORMAN

The period between the closely fought federal elections of 1954 and 1961, explored in The Menzies Ascendency: Fortune, Stability, Progress, is a unique moment in Australian political history. Not just because Robert Menzies enjoyed an electoral dominance that few of his counterparts can boast, but primarily because that dominance came at a time when the government had already won three consecutive elections. Indeed, including his first stint as prime minister from 1939-41, Menzies had already broken Billy Hughes’s existing record as our longest serving prime minister as early as 30 November 1954.

Normally when a new government comes to power it enjoys initial popularity, that wanes over the years until they gradually and inevitably alienate enough people that they are kicked out of office. Swings to incumbents can and do occur, particularly when Oppositions find creative ways of making themselves unelectable. But if Menzies’ 1955 landslide might be compared to John Howard’s drubbing of Mark Latham almost 50 years later, imagining Howard going on to pick up two additional seats in 2007 (as Menzies did in 1958), gives you an idea of how astonishing this feat was.

Of course, Menzies had the advantage that he was not dealing with a fresh-faced Opposition Leader in Kevin Rudd, whose flaws were as, of yet, unknown to the public. But instead, a third contest with Herbert Evatt, whose career and sanity had been unravelling before the electors’ very eyes. Menzies also had the advantage of the Labor Split which, although he would not need the DLP preferences it provided until 1961, stood out as the visible manifestation of Evatt’s failings. As is skilfully explored in a chapter by Anne Henderson.

While often referred to simply as “the split”, this was in fact the fourth time that the Labor Party had torn itself apart in such a fashion. What stands out about the split of the 1950s is that while its predecessors had been based on matters of profound principle: members losing their freedom of conscience to the caucus pledge in the 1890s, whether the pressing needs of World War I justified conscription in the 1910s, and how to deal with the calamitous effects of the Great Depression in the 1930s; number four seems to have been entirely unnecessary.

While James Scullin’s failure was an inability to prevent his party splitting to both the left and the right in a manner that gave the UAP a decade in power, Henderson makes a compelling case that Evatt instigated a split that would keep his party on the Opposition benches for far longer. Although, as with any stuff-up of this magnitude, other factors served to exacerbate the issue. Notably the arrested development of the Victorian branch of the ALP, expertly examined by Paul Strangio.

But, however much Menzies was fighting an opponent who seemed determined to gift him victories, it needs to be recognised that his government maintained a clear sense of purpose, which helped it to stay in office for so long. In recent times, we have seen even relatively young governments lose any sense of direction, to the point where the public questions what on earth they want to achieve beyond staying in office. Once Tony Abbott retreated from his crusade to balance the budget and was eventually knifed, Turnbull’s Coalition Government began grasping at hollow slogans like “innovative and agile”. What the Albanese Government has stood for in the wake of the Voice defeat is equally anyone’s guess.

Menzies in contrast seems to have been invigorated by the opportunity to embark on nation building projects that he cared deeply about. He pursued longstanding passions, like his belief in the multifaceted benefits of university education, which became the extensive reforms of the Murray Report. Something that Andrew Norton’s chapter demonstrates was a distinctly Menzian program, that few of his colleagues showed the same interest in.

Menzies also discovered new passions, such as the development of Canberra. For which he “became an Apostle” according to Ted Ling. While many of us might have misgivings about the bush capital and how it isolates bureaucrats into their own echo chamber, Menzies deserves credit for at least making it a worthy capital. From the National Library to the Royal Mint, to the ridiculously oversized footpaths (built in response to Menzies’s daughter Heather’s complaints about the difficulty of navigating ACT streets with a pram), to the filling of Lake Burley Griffin. So much of what we now know as Canberra we owe not just to Menzies, but to him having the electoral security to do things that were unlikely to win votes (particularly considering ACT residents were then virtually disenfranchised).

Such spending and security were also predicated on prosperity. And while the economic growth of the Menzies era is often dismissed on the grounds of its contemporary equivalents overseas, Australia faced unique challenges, which David Lee’s chapter shows that the Menzies government skilfully overcame. In the 1950s, Australia was still heavily reliant on agricultural exports and the British export market, neither of which were at all reliable enough for our living standards to grow as they did under Menzies. Whose government pioneered new markets through the landmark 1957 Commerce Agreement with Japan, and the lesser-known sale of vast quantities of wheat to a Chinese communist government we had yet to officially recognise. Equally it was “pig iron Bob”, who had been attacked so vociferously for facilitating the sale of scrap iron to Japan in 1938, who ended restrictions on the export of iron ore and even overcame protectionist fears to allow necessary Japanese investment in the industry. Ushering in the mining boom we have since been so reliant upon.

Another fundamental economic reform made during this era that is still with us today was the creation of the Reserve Bank of Australia. For his chapter, the RBA’s historian Selwyn Cornish delves deep into the archives to reveal how the story of the bank’s creation serves as a remarkable demonstration of Menzies’s political shrewdness. Having gone to a double dissolution over banking legislation in 1951, Menzies was initially of the view that the issue needed a “political holiday” to allow the system he had put in place to consolidate. He had a justifiable fear that if he kept banking as a live issue, and pushed reform too far, it might provide Labor with the opportunity to reverse all his government’s good work in the field. As would happen to industrial relations after Howard’s Work Choices. But when the calls for a completely independent Reserve Bank coming from within his Liberal Party and the private sector became too loud to ignore, Menzies picked his moment, and was able to bring a very reluctant Country Party along with him.

The RBA example shows that while part of the secret to the Menzies Government’s success was its ability to maintain a sense of purpose, it was equally wise enough not to pursue change for change’s sake or to become too ideological. A push to give income taxing powers back to the states, documented by Stephen Wilks, may have been popular with the Liberal Party base. But the idea of paying two income taxes was unlikely to have sat well with the electorate, or most state premiers apart from Victoria’s Henry Bolte, so a Liberal commitment to federalism was quietly compromised.

Menzies has been criticised for the fact that in the realm of Indigenous affairs, he did stick to a federalist formula that left the issue as a matter for the states. This was in no small part because a Commonwealth takeover of Indigenous affairs would require extending the “race power”, when Menzies thought that if anything it needed to be removed entirely from the constitution. But the Federal Government still had the power to enact reforms when it came to the Northern Territory, with Damien Freeman and Andrew Bragg showing that Minister for Territories Paul Hasluck not only had a profound interest in the welfare of our First Nations peoples. But he was equally determined to improve their condition without resorting to programs based on explicit racial categories.

In the realm of geopolitics and national security, The Menzies Ascendency likewise reveals a mixture of achievement, stability, and sound judgement. The achievement came in spearheading the creation of the Antarctic Treaty of 1959, which helped to secure Australia’s claim to 42 per cent of the frozen continent and remains in effect today. This is one of the most significant impacts Australia has ever had on global governance, but it has hitherto been virtually absent from histories of the Menzies Government. Perhaps, argues Elizabeth Buchanan, because Menzies was in no mood to advertise the fact that he had teamed up closely with the Soviets to accomplish it.

Stability and sound judgement came through accepting reality on the fate of “West New Guinea”, without capitulating in such a way that might encourage further Indonesian territorial aggression. Sean Jacobs, himself PNG born, argues that the episode demonstrates a Menzian foreign policy that was “independent, measured, and balanced”, pursuing Australian interests even when they aligned with neither of our “great and powerful friends” in Britain and the United States.

But just as with Menzies’s electoral fortunes, it was not just his own positives qualities which led to success. There was a clear element of providential luck. As when his infamous intervention in the Suez Crisis blew up in his face, Richard Casey was able to step in in the nick of time to prevent a major falling out with President Eisenhower. Former Australian Ambassador to Egypt Bob Bowker, whose chapter is heavily critical of Menzies’s approach during the saga, ultimately concludes that he basically got away with it scot-free, doing very little damage to Australia’s long-term interests.

Another “close shave” closes out the period, with Menzies narrowly hanging on at the 1961 election. In which Lyndon Megarrity shows it was the angry voters of Queensland, hitherto firm Coalition supporters, who almost ran him out of office.

Which leads us to a final and pivotal question, was Menzies simply lucky or are there lessons that can be drawn from his unprecedented success for political leaders today? Greg Melleuish makes the case that despite claims by the intelligentsia that Menzies was backward and behind the times, he was in fact a leader perfectly suited to his era and attuned to the mood of the electorate. While the baby boomers born into Menzian prosperity had no appreciation for it and would demand major social changes, their parents had endured world wars and a great depression, and were more than happy to live in an era of peace and continuity. As Melleuish points out, the level of “comfort” they enjoyed was virtual austerity by modern standards, with credit, food variety, and entertainments all being limited. But these were people who had lived through enough of history and, consequently, saw what a blessing it was to be able to raise their families with a secure job and in a home that they owned.

As Paul Kelly puts it, Menzies was an incrementalist who “downplayed change to keep the public assured”. Yet he equally kept far enough ahead of the curb that Australian living standards consistently improved. We never fell behind, such that major and disturbing changes were simply not needed.

Even after 80 years of mass migration, which has changed the complexion of the electorate greatly from Menzies’s day, there are enduring qualities about the Australian public and what they want from their political leaders. As demonstrated in our propensity to reject unnecessary constitutional tinkering, which is just as strong as ever, there is an innate conservatism about the Australian people, who abide by the philosophy of “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”. They appreciate that Australia is one of the world’s most successful liberal democracies and are glad to be free of the turmoil of wherever their ancestors originally came from.

Of course, the caveat is that sometimes it is broke, and it does need fixing. So, the real secret to Menzies’ success was that he conducted constant, but always restrained, maintenance to keep the car travelling steadily along the road to a better future. Paul Keating famously attacked Menzies for having “put the country into neutral” so that we “very gently ground to a halt in the nowhere land of the early 1980s”. But the lesson of The Menzies Ascendency is that those who came after the great man, simply did not see or appreciate the constant work he was putting in to ensure our smooth ride.