Australian referendum, 1974 (Mode of Altering the Constitution)

Since federation, voters in the Australian territories had been excluded from voting in referendums. Constitution Alteration (Mode of Altering the Constitution) 1974 was an Australian referendum held in the 1974 referendums which sought to alter the Australian Constitution to enabling electors in the Northern Territory and the Australian Capital Territory to vote in referendums and for their votes to be counted in the national majority, but not towards any state total.

Question

Proposed law entitled "An Act to facilitate alterations to the Constitution and to allow electors in territories, as well as electors in the states, to vote at referendums on proposed laws to alter the Constitution".

Do you approve the proposed law?

Results

Result
State On

rolls

Ballots

issued

For Against Invalid
% %
New South Wales 2,834,558 2,702,903 1,367,476 51.35% 1,295,621 48.65% 39,806
Victoria 2,161,474 2,070,893 1,001,753 49.22% 1,033,486 50.78% 35,654
Queensland 1,154,762 1,098,401 480,926 44.29% 604,816 55.71% 12,659
South Australia 750,308 722,434 311,954 44.26% 392,891 55.74% 17,589
Western Australia 612,016 577,989 240,134 42.53% 324,435 57.47% 13,420
Tasmania 246,596 237,891 95,264 40.72% 138,674 59.28% 3,953
Australian Total 7,759,714 7,410,511 3,497,507 47.99% 3,789,923 52.01% 123,081
Obtained majority in one State and an overall minority of 292,416 votes.
Not carried

Discussion

This referendum attempted to alter the way in which the results of referendum questions would be tallied. The votes of residents of territories was to be included in the national totals for deciding national majority, and only three of the six states would need to have a state vote of yes rather than four as in previous referendums.

Prior to this referendum, failure to win a carry in a majority of states had resulted in rejection of three referendum questions which would have otherwise carried had this modification been in place, although in none of the two instances where double majorites were not taken place following this referendum the change wouldn't have made any difference.

A similar question without the modification to the double majority rule was put to referendum in Australian referendum, 1977 (Referendums), and was carried strongly. Given this, and examining the results of this question it can be inferred that the states with small populations were unwilling to give up their power for the sake of giving votes to territorians.

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