Background
Stanley Bruce was born in Melbourne on April 15, 1883, the son of a successful merchant.
(Report Of Inter-Imperial Relations Committee. Address By ...)
Report Of Inter-Imperial Relations Committee. Address By Stanley Melbourne Bruce, Prime Minister Of Australia.
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Diplomat international administrator statesman
Stanley Bruce was born in Melbourne on April 15, 1883, the son of a successful merchant.
Stanley was educated in Melbourne and Trinity Hall, Cambridge, where he graduated in law, and from 1906 practiced in London at Middle Temple.
Bruce enlisted in 1914 and served in a British regiment; he was twice wounded before his discharge in 1917. Returning to Melbourne to direct the family business, Bruce was elected as a Nationalist party candidate to the House of Representatives in 1918.
He was on a private visit to Europe when asked to represent Australia at the League of Nations Assembly meeting in 1921. On his return to Australia, he became treasurer under Premier William Morris Hughes.
The leader of the Government After the general election of 1922 Bruce was chosen as Nationalist party leader, and in 1923 he became prime minister in a Nationalist-Country coalition of generally conservative complexion. Bruce called for economies in all phases of economic life and particularly for cost reduction, which he believed could be achieved through wage restraint. By inclination and experience, Bruce favored an "empire" approach dedicated to rebuilding Britain's diminished strength through "all pulling together" in the imperial cause.
As part of an attack on economic problems at home and abroad, he promoted immigration from Britain to Australia, with emphasis on rural settlement. State governments were encouraged to maximize their role in such plans, but the Development and Migration Act of 1926 was an ambitious federal attempt to initiate resource surveys, promote investment, and coordinate labor requirements.
Lasting achievements of Bruce's government were the establishment of a national scientific research body and the federal-states compact of 1928, under which a loan council was set up with powers to regulate the borrowings of all government agencies. Administration of the government-owned Commonwealth Bank was revamped by placing the bank under an eight-man board drawn almost wholly from the private sector.
To advise on fiscal policy, an independent tariff board was created, while grower-dominated boards were established to regulate the marketing of various agricultural products.
Returned in 1928 with a narrow majority, Bruce's administration faced a deteriorating economic situation. Commodity prices had fallen overseas, the country had to meet heavy overseas interest payments with shrunken export earnings, and unemployment was widespread. In 1929 there were numerous strikes and a serious lockout in the coal industry. Bruce intensified pressures on labor by strengthening coercive laws and demanding fines on striking unions.
There was sharp political disagreement concerning the proper role of federal and state authorities in handling labor disputes, and Bruce took the unprecedented step of proposing that the federal government virtually withdraw from industrial arbitration.
Deserted by some of his shocked followers in September 1929, Bruce called a special election in which his administration was soundly defeated; he lost his own seat in the debacle.
International Statesman Bruce was reelected in 1931 but remained in Parliament only a year before returning to London, where he represented Australia at the World Monetary and Economic Conference of 1933. Later that year he became Australian high commissioner, a post he retained until 1945. From 1942 to 1945 Bruce was the representative of the Australian government in the United Kingdom War Cabinet and the Pacific War Council in London.
Under instructions from the government of John Curtin, he accented Australia's claims to the full prior consultation on matters affecting basic strategy on the conduct of the war, and he pressed the case for a buildup of Allied forces in Australia as the major base for launching a counteroffensive against Japan.
(Report Of Inter-Imperial Relations Committee. Address By ...)
Leader of the Government After the general election of 1922 Bruce was chosen as Nationalist party leader, and in 1923 he became prime minister in a Nationalist-Country coalition of generally conservative complexion.
He believed in close ties with the British Empire without diminishing Australia's self-government. In office Bruce pursued an energetic and diverse agenda. He comprehensively overhauled federal government administration and oversaw its transfer to the new capital city of Canberra. He implemented various reforms to the Australian federal system to strengthen the role of the Commonwealth, and helped develop the forerunners of the Australian Federal Police and the CSIRO. Bruce's "men, money and markets" scheme was an ambitious attempt to rapidly expand Australia's population and economic potential through massive government investment and closer ties with Great Britain and the rest of the British Empire.
However, his endeavours to overhaul Australia's industrial relations system brought his government into frequent conflict with the labour movement, and his radical proposal to abolish Commonwealth arbitration in 1929 prompted members of his own party to cross the floor to defeat the government. In the resounding loss at the subsequent election the prime minister lost his own seat, an event unprecedented in Australia and one that would not occur again until 2007.
Quotations:
"I feel very strongly that it will be impossible to find a solution to the political problems of Europe and remove the present nightmare conditions unless something is done to improve the economic position . .. it is vital for the prestige and future wellbeing of the League that it should afford active leadership towards bringing about economic appeasement. "
Speaking to the delegates in Dandenong, Bruce summed up his political philosophy:
"A plain soldier and business man. I am no politician, nor have I any desire to be one. In the course of my commercial career it has been my fate to have had much experience of politicians and their ways. What I have seen in the course of that experience has given me little respect either for the professional politician or his methods. I am desirous of seeing this country governed in the ways of clear common sense and good sound business principles, and I think that desire of mine is heartily share by the vast majority of the population. "
By 1912 Bruce was a wealthy businessman and successful barrister, and it was in this year Ethel Dunlop Anderson traveled to England and was reacquainted with Bruce, whom she had known as a child. Aged 32, Ethel was of similar Scottish-Irish ancestry and hailed from a prominent squatter family of Victoria. She shared many of Bruce's interests, especially golf, and his political outlook. They married in July 1913 in a quiet ceremony.