Psephology And The Palace Letters

It's a nearly annual tradition on this site to release something every Christmas Day.  (Click the Xmas tag for previous examples.) It's also an annual tradition when I write the annual review, to list pieces that languished in the draft section, some barely started, others more or less complete but never quite seeing the light of day.  When I did this last year there was an unusual level of interest (a whole three enthusiastic requests!) in one of the unreleased items, about "psephological themes in the Palace Letters" and I decided to make it this year's Christmas present to readers.  This article mostly focuses on the 1974-5 cycle although the letters cover the 1975-7 cycle as well.   By the way, I am not the only psephologist dropping down chimneys with offerings this year.

The Palace Letters are a series of correspondence (not all of it related to federal politics) between the Queen's Private Secretary Sir Martin Charteris and Governor-General Sir John Kerr in the leadup to and the aftermath of the November 11 1975 sacking of the Whitlam Government.  They also include a large number of media articles that are public documents but would not be well known to a modern audience and that are fun to read over.  The letters were released after a very prolonged legal stoush, especially thanks to the persistence of Whitlam biographer and political historian Jenny Hocking.  

Not-A-Poll: Best Prime Minister Of The Last 45 Years - The Winner Is ...

Image: Bill Bradley

Grand Final: Whitlam 262 - Keating 173

"But the best team, the best policies, the best advisers are not enough. I need your help. I need the help of the Australian people; and, given that, I do not for a moment believe that we should set limits on what we can achieve, together, for our country, our people, our future."

I'm very busy with the Tasmanian election but a quick note that Gough Whitlam has easily won the final round of my Best Prime Minister Of The Last 45 Years Not-A-Poll.  It's been a long road full of unexpected reversals and some comically foolish stack attempts but in the end the candidate who has generally dominated has won.  

Whitlam won the first four rounds (some narrowly) as various lesser lights were eliminated, and tied with Paul Keating in round five, but the final was a fizzer.  Gough bolted to a fifty-vote lead in the early days, and while the percentage margin closed from then on in, the vote margin never did.  In the end it was a very easy win with 60.2% two-candidate preferred; presumably the Gillard voters of previous rounds mostly switched to him.  In the early days of this round I scanned the voting for anything suss, but since it became obvious Whitlam was going to win I've been less diligent, and in any case there have been no suspicious movements in the total. 

Whitlam was always going to be a contender as (the left-wing bias of this site's readerbase aside) his government had great reforming successes in its few turbulent years, hence his widespread reputation as the political father of modern Australia.  As a reader mentioned in one of the earlier rounds, there was also no shortage of chaos and governance failure, so his position will forever be debated.  As an ex-PM he carried his legacy with dignity despite the provocations of his contentious removal and hence became a living legend.  (How a PM nurtures their legacy after leaving office has had quite a bit to do with some of the results here, in my view).

Gough wins immunity from the Worst PM Of The Last 45 Years poll, which will be started in April and run in two rounds (a primary round and then, if nobody gets 50% in the first round, a runoff for the top two.)

Thanks all for the interest in this one; it has been quite a fun exercise.  

Not-A-Poll: Best Prime Minister Of The Last 45 Years: Grand Final!

     VS  
(image source, licence)                                (image source, licence) 


Round 5: Whitlam and Keating tie, Gillard eliminated
Disputed Returns adjusts Gillard total following stacking (result not affected)

The last round is upon us.  These two dashing gentlemen (actually both pictured several years before they became Prime Minister) are the final contestants for this site's multi-stage Best Prime Minister of the last 45 years.  Hmmm, I think there might be a lot of Tasmanians voting in the final round somehow.  These two are the last left standing after they tied for first (following four previous outright Whitlam wins) at the end of a cracking round which had the following raw final totals:

Best Prime Minister Of The Past 45 Years: Round 5

(image source, licence)

"A conservative government survives essentially by dampening expectations and subduing hopes. Conservatism is basically pessimistic, reformism is basically optimistic."

Excluded: John Howard (13.9%)

I chose this particular quote from the primary vote leader of round 4 of my multi-month best PM Not-A-Poll as a send-off by said leader to the last eliminated Liberal contestant.  Given the left-wing bias of this site's readership and consumers of psephology in general, Howard has actually done pretty well to make it this far, but overachieved by somehow edging out Bob Hawke in round 3, and his elimination in this round always looked extremely likely.  

Not-A-Poll: Best Prime Minister Of The Last 45 Years, Round 4

(Image: Flickr:Gostalgia licence)

"The main sufferers in Australian society — the main victims of social deprivation and restricted opportunity - have been the oldest Australians on the one hand and the newest Australians on the other. " 

Three months ago, I started a multi-round Not-A-Poll to determine this site's choice for the title of Best Prime Minister of the Last 45 Years.  Each round, one Prime Minister (sometimes more) is given the boot until someone gets over 50% and wins.  Each round runs for about a month, so you can vote for different candidates from month to month if you want to.  Multiple voting is in theory banned, but still readily possible at low levels; adjustments may be made if required.  It is what it is, but at least it's preferential in a way, unlike, say, Australian bird of the year.

The winner of each round gets a photo and a quote on the top, except for the final round when photos of both candidates will go up together.  And there is an obscure rule that if there is a new Prime Minister voting stops for a month to give the new PM time to establish themselves as incredibly brilliant and win the contest. I mention that because there's chatter about that the incumbent (eliminated in last place in this contest with a ridiculously small vote) might not even last the coming sitting week.

Not-A-Poll: Best Prime Minister Of The Last 45 Years: Round 3

"The Honourable Leader of the Opposition, Sir Billy Snedden, has broken his promise: the promise he made to me before the election. He promised not to tell any lies about me, if I didn't tell the truth about him."*

(image source, reuse subject to licence)

Two months ago I started a multi-round Not-A-Poll to determine this site's visitors' choice for the title of Best Prime Minister of the Last 45 Years.  The idea is that each month the Prime Minister in last place is eliminated and the rest continue until someone gets over 50% and wins.  There are rules permitting multiple exclusions in certain cases, to speed up the process a bit.  Each round runs for a month, so you can vote for different candidates from round to round if you want to. Multiple voting is in theory banned and adjustments may be made if I detect it, but there will probably be a lot of low-level multiple voting I can't detect or prevent. Comments about the merits of the contestants are welcome.

Not-A-Poll: Best Prime Minister Of The Last 45 Years - Round 2

PRIMARY VOTE LEADER FROM ROUND 1: Whitlam
EXCLUDED IN ROUND 1: Turnbull, Fraser
Rudd continues only because of irregular voting patterns for Abbott

Round 2 voting open in sidebar til 6 pm AEDST, 31 October

A month ago I started a multi-round Not-A-Poll to determine this site's visitors' choice for the title of Best Prime Minister of the Last 45 Years.  The idea is that each month the Prime Minister in last place is eliminated and the rest continue until someone gets over 50% and wins.  There are rules permitting multiple exclusions in certain cases, to speed up the process a bit.  Each round runs for a month, so you can vote for different candidates from round to round if you want to. Multiple voting is in theory banned and adjustments may be made if I detect it, but there will probably be a lot of low-level multiple voting I can't detect or prevent. Comments about the merits of the contestants are welcome.

Technical note: If you wish to vote on a mobile, switch to "View web version" at the bottom of an article.

Not-A-Poll: Best Prime Minister Of The Last 45 Years

(Round 1 has closed.  For results see Round 2.)

Round 1

Now and then we see newspaper polls rating the best PMs of the last few decades, or in the case of one Essential poll last week, the best government of the last ten years.  John Howard is a persistent "winner" of the first class of polling, but I've always believed he has an unfair advantage.  He tends to get a very high share of the Liberal vote with other Liberal PMs hardly getting any, while the Labor vote tends to be split up more between Hawke, Keating, Whitlam, Rudd and Gillard.  For that reason it's not clear whether Howard would beat all the Labor PMs on a head-to-head basis, although it looks like he probably would.

I've decided to run a similar Not-A-Poll exercise here in the sidebar just for fun over a period of several months.  The basic rule is that we keep going eliminating one PM at a time (perhaps more) until someone has over 50% at the end of a month.  The more complicated rules are: