Australia. A Federated Country
By Samaya Oakley Room 9
On 1 January 1901, Australia became an independent nation when New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, Western Australia and Tasmania came together and formed a country which is what we now know as Australia. This is called federation. Federation is when many colonies join together to form a big nation. Australia experienced many stages prior becoming a country. Prior 1901, at that time, the continent consisted of six very separate and different British colonies. Each of them having their own government, laws, defence force, its own stamps and collected taxes on goods that crossed their borders. The colonies had even built different railways, so it was much harder to travel, because you would have to keep switching trains. Federation only went ahead with a referendum, letting Australia vote “yes” or “no.” This was a chance for all Australian citizens to equally have a say. If we didn’t have this law, Australia wouldn’t be the country that we all live in
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Two years later, the leaders drafted a constitution for the Commonwealth of Australia, but the idea didn’t work out, and the leaders and citizens lost interest of becoming a federation. In 1893, a conference in Corowa, New South Wales, was held to hold a new convention to decide on a new draft constitution for federation. They had finally realized how important this law could be. A few years later, a special conference agrees to have a new federation convention. A second conference renews for another federation convention. In 1897-98 The third National Australasian Convention meets in Adelaide, Melbourne and Sydney and agrees to the