The dominion of Western Australia
- Thread starter Dr Pervez Hoodbhoy
- Start date
Anaxagoras
Banned
Conceivably, the Australians would have to come together anyway to face Japanese aggression. The 1933 secession might have been undone by military necessity (it was the Japanese threat which caused the Australians to ratify the Statute of Westminster, after all).
Well, it actually says:
WHEREAS the people of New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, Queensland, and Tasmania, humbly relying on the blessing of Almighty God, have agreed to unite in one indissoluble Federal Commonwealth...
Note that WA isn't mentioned in that indissoluble Federal Commonwealth. But that's just quibbling caused by political compromises, and I agree with your point.
And that's true no matter what the Constitution says.
You really ought to put those arguments into your sig, since it seems this comes up so often.
However they were an original state. But admittedly the WA secessionists would argue this point you've raised above. But what's more important is that the Preamble isn't legally binding, which is what the secessionists will argue first. Consequentially the Commonwealth would have to argue successfully two things in order to keep WA in the Commonwealth:
1) That somewhere in the Constitution, the part about an indissoluble union is implied, meaning the Preamble can be used as Constitutional Law, &;
2) That WA is an original state thus meaning it is stuck in the Commonwealth along with the rest of us.
The first point is somewhat hard, although the Founding Fathers argue that the bit about the indissoluble union is in fact the spirit of the entire Constitution (see The Annotated Constitution of the Australian Commonwealth by Quick & Garran). Whilst the second point is simple to prove by just looking at the several Sectons mentioning WA as such - Section 26 comes immediately to mind.
LOL, so true
