James Ford Cairns(4 October 1914 – 12 October 2003) was an Australian politician who was prominent in the Labor movement through the 1960s and 1970s, and was briefly Treasurer and the fourthdeputy prime ministerof Australia, both in theWhitlamgovernment. He is best remembered as a leader of the movement against Australian involvement in theVietnam War,for his affair withJunie Morosiand for his later renunciation of conventional politics. He was also aneconomist,and a prolific writer on economic and social issues, many of them self-published and self-marketed at stalls he ran across Australia after his retirement.
Jim Cairns | |
|---|---|
 Cairns in 1976 | |
| Deputy Prime Minister of Australia | |
| In office 12 June 1974 – 2 July 1975 | |
| Prime Minister | Gough Whitlam |
| Preceded by | Lance Barnard |
| Succeeded by | Frank Crean |
| Treasurer of Australia | |
| In office 11 December 1974 – 6 June 1975 | |
| Prime Minister | Gough Whitlam |
| Preceded by | Frank Crean |
| Succeeded by | Bill Hayden |
| Minister for the Environment | |
| In office 6 June 1975 – 2 July 1975 | |
| Prime Minister | Gough Whitlam |
| Preceded by | Moss Cass |
| Succeeded by | Gough Whitlam |
| Minister for Overseas Trade | |
| In office 19 December 1972 – 11 December 1974 | |
| Prime Minister | Gough Whitlam |
| Preceded by | Gough Whitlam |
| Succeeded by | Frank Crean |
| Minister for Secondary Industry | |
| In office 19 December 1972 – 9 October 1973 | |
| Prime Minister | Gough Whitlam |
| Preceded by | Gough Whitlam |
| Succeeded by | Kep Enderby |
| Deputy Leader of the Labor Party | |
| In office 12 June 1974 – 2 July 1975 | |
| Leader | Gough Whitlam |
| Preceded by | Lance Barnard |
| Succeeded by | Frank Crean |
| Member of theAustralian Parliament forYarra | |
| In office 10 December 1955 – 25 October 1969 | |
| Preceded by | Stan Keon |
| Succeeded by | Division abolished |
| Member of theAustralian Parliament forLalor | |
| In office 25 October 1969 – 10 November 1977 | |
| Preceded by | Mervyn Lee |
| Succeeded by | Barry Jones |
| Personal details | |
| Born | James Ford Cairns 4 October 1914 Carlton,Victoria,Australia |
| Died | 12 October 2003(aged 89) Narre Warren East,Victoria,Australia |
| Political party | Australian Labor Party |
| Spouse | Gwen Robb |
| Alma mater | University of Melbourne |
| Occupation | Policeman, lecturer |
Early days
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James Ford Cairns was born inCarlton,then a working-class suburb ofMelbourne,the son of a clerk. He grew up on a dairy farm north ofSunbury.[1]His father went to theWorld War Ias a lieutenant in the Australian Imperial Forces, but became disillusioned with the war and lost his respect forBritain.He did not return to Australia. Following the war he essentially deserted his family, and he traveled toAfricawhere he committed suicide after a stay of six or seven years. Many years later, Cairns informedGough Whitlamthat he had long believed that his father had been killed in World War I, but that he was eventually told the truth of his father's desertion.[2]
Cairns attended Sunbury State School and laterNorthcote High School,where he completed his Leaving Certificate. Though life duringthe Depressionwas difficult with his mother having to work to provide for the family, and with himself having to make a three-hour daily commute by train, he was a good student, making his name at Northcote High School due to entering the school'sbroad jumpchampionship and winning it easily with a jump of twenty feet and two inches, his competitors producing jumps of sixteen to seventeen feet.[1]
In 1933 Cairns joined thePolice Forceto have more time for athletics. He soon became a detective and gained notoriety working in a special surveillance team known as "the dogs" shadowing squad, where he was involved in a number of dramatic arrests.[1]While working, he studied at night and completed aneconomicsdegree at theUniversity of Melbourne.He was the first Victorian policeman to hold a tertiary degree. In 1939 he married Gwen Robb (died 2000), whose two sons he adopted.
Cairns left the police in 1944. Thereafter he was employed, successively, as a tutor and lecturer in theArmyand as a senior lecturer in economic history, at theUniversity of Melbourne.[1]He was a knowledgeable economist and was considered asocialist.In 1946 he applied to join theCommunist Party,but was rejected.[1]
Following this rejection, Cairns joined theLabor Party(ALP) and became active in its left wing. The Victorian division of the ALP had by this time been infiltrated by the mostly Catholic "Groupers", associated withArchbishop MannixandB. A. Santamaria,and Cairns was a leading opponent of this group.[1]
In 1955, when the federal Labor leader,H. V. Evatt,attacked the Groupers and brought on a major split in the Labor Party, Cairns sided with Evatt. At the1955 election,he stood for theHouse of Representativesfor the working-class seat ofYarra,held by the leading Grouper,Stan Keon.In what Cairns has been quoted as saying was "... the most active and intense and vigorous election campaign that's ever been run in Australia",[1]Cairns was elected and held Yarra until1969,when it was abolished at a redistribution. He then shifted toLalorin Melbourne's western suburbs. The seat had been in Labor hands since its creation in 1949, but had been taken by LiberalMervyn Leein 1966, as part of that year's pro-Liberal landslide. However, a redistribution wiped out Lee's majority and gave Labor a notional majority of six per cent. Rather than face almost certain defeat, Lee made an unsuccessful bid for the seat ofBendigo.This proved prescient, as Cairns easily won Lalor with a healthy swing.
Leading left-winger
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InCanberra,Cairns became a leader of the left. He was a highly effective debater and was soon feared and disliked by ministers in theLiberalgovernment ofRobert Menzies,although his personal dealings with Menzies himself, who nearly always felt a healthy respect for an intelligent and principled adversary, were more cordial than might have been expected.[1]Cairns was also disliked by many in his own party, who saw him as an ideologue whose political views were too left-wing for the Australian electorate. Like many Labor figures of his generation, Cairns spent most of his best years in opposition due to the Coalition's unbroken run in government from 1949 to 1972.
Nevertheless, Cairns' abilities could not be denied. He completed hisdoctoratein economic history in 1957, and by the 1960s he was among the Labor Party's leading figures. At this time he also lectured on Marxist and socialist history, and taught free seminars in Melbourne for working people who were unable to afford tertiary education. His first overseas trip, which he took place at this time to the US and Asia, had a great effect on him.
Early in 1967, the septuagenarianArthur Calwellretired as Labor leader, and Cairns contested the leadership, but lost toGough Whitlam.The following year, when Whitlam briefly offered his resignation as part of his fight against the left wing of the party, Cairns again contested the leadership. Although he again failed to win, the margin was much smaller than in the previous year, and if four ALP parliamentarians had changed their minds, Cairns would have been successful. Whitlam appointed Cairns as shadow minister for trade and industry.[1]By this time, Cairns, like other left-wing firebrands of his generation such asClyde CameronandTom Uren,strongly supported Whitlam, as they were sober enough to realise Labor would never win power again without policies that appealed to the middle class.
One of the reasons Cairns did not become leader of the Labor Party was that in the late 1960s and early 1970s his main focus was not on parliamentary politics but on leading the mass movement against theVietnam War,to which the Menzies government had committed combat troops in 1965, and againstconscriptionfor that war. Until about 1968, most Australians supported the war. Whitlam himself was cautious about publicly committing the ALP to an explicitly anti-war stance. Opposition to Australia's role in Vietnam was led by the Communist Party and the trade unions. After 1968, however, non-communist opposition grew, and Cairns came to see the anti-war movement as a moral crusade. During the election year of 1969, a group of men broke into Cairns’ home,assaultedhim and seriously injured his wife.[1]
In 1968, the psychiatristJohn Diamondconducted a series of in-depth, psychologically probing interviews with Cairns. The interviews, which were recorded on audiotape, have been described as "politically unique" by one of Cairns' biographers.[3]They were initiated by the department of Political Science at Monash University, which was interested in researching the psychological motivations of politicians, but Cairns then continued them privately with Diamond over the course of a year, finding them to be "a voyage of self-discovery."[4]Another of Cairns' biographers, Paul Strangio, had noted how, in his interview technique, Diamond successfully "managed to penetrate his subject’s emotional defences."[5][6]
In May 1970, Cairns, as chair of theVietnam Moratorium Campaign,led an estimated 100,000 people in a "sit-down" demonstration in the streets ofMelbourne.This was the largest protest in Australia until it was overtaken by theanti-Iraq war protestsin February 2003. Similar protests of proportionate size took place simultaneously in other Australian cities. The predicted violence did not occur and the moral force of the, mainly young, protesters had a major effect on Australian attitudes to the war.[1]
Cairns in Government
editAt theDecember 1972 election,Whitlam led the Labor Party into government for the first time in 23 years, and Cairns becameMinister for Overseas TradeandMinister for Secondary Industry.He had by now shed much of his socialist ideology of earlier years, though he was still a strong believer in state planning. He got along surprisingly well with the heads of industry, although critics said this was because he was sympathetic to their requests for government assistance. During his time as Minister for Trade and Minister for Secondary Industry, Cairns undertook a number of overseas trade visits. The most successful of his overseas visits was to China which resulted in an increase in Australian trade with China from 200 million dollars before the visit to 1,000 million dollars a year after his visit.[1]After the1974 election,Cairns was elected Deputy Leader of the Labor Party, defeatingLance Barnard54 votes to 42,[7]and thus becameDeputy Prime Minister.
In June, ‘’The Bulletin’’ magazine published a leakedAustralian Security Intelligence Organisationdocument which gave a controversial, highly political view of Cairns. The political fallout from the leak led the government to act on its 1974 election policy to establish theRoyal Commission on Intelligence and Security.[8]
In December 1974, Whitlam appointed Cairns asTreasurer.This was the high-point of Cairns' political career. On Christmas Day 1974, while Whitlam was overseas,Cyclone Tracydevastated the city ofDarwin,and Cairns as Acting Prime Minister impressed the nation with his sympathetic and decisive leadership. It was during this period, however, that Cairns hiredJunie Morosias his principal private secretary, and he soon began a relationship with her which would eventually help ruin his career.
Australia's already severe economic problems worsened during 1975, and Cairns had few answers to the new phenomenon ofstagflation,the combination of high unemployment and high inflation that followed the1973 oil crisis.Overseas finance ministers, especially in Britain and Europe, faced the same problems at this time, but as few Australians were exposed to the foreign media, the economic credibility of the Whitlam administration suffered.
Loans affair
editIn late 1974, in an attempt to raise funds for large capital works projects (such as drilling for gas on the north-west shelf between Australia andTimorand constructing a pipeline for transporting the gas down to Eastern Australia), senior ministersRex ConnorandLionel Murphy,along with Prime Minister Gough Whitlam, began to consider arrangements to borrow approximately US$4,000 millionpetrodollarsfrom the Middle East. The plan was to use the services of an intermediary, Pakistani bankerTirath Khemlani.Cairns first became aware of what was to become known as the "Loans Affair"three days after being appointed Treasurer, on 13 December 1974, when he entered at the end of a meeting of the Labor Party federal executive atthe Lodge,the official residence of the Prime Minister in Canberra. Whitlam explained the situation and asked that Cairns co-sign approval for the loan. Cairns did so, noting to Whitlam that the state premiers should be informed of the loan (this did not occur). Subsequently, Sir Frederick Wheeler, Secretary of the Treasury (the head of Cairns' department) and other members of staff advised Cairns that Khemlani was of questionable character. In his capacity as Acting Prime Minister during Gough Whitlam's overseas trip covering late 1974 to early 1975, Cairns arranged a meeting at the Reserve Bank in Canberra attended by various senior officials, including Lionel Murphy and Rex Connor. Connor's authority to borrow the loan was cancelled as a result of the meeting. Whitlam returned from overseas on 19 January 1975 and on 27 January 1975, Connor's authority to borrow the loan was reinstated without consultation with Cairns, who found out after the fact. A short time later, when Cairns was about to visit the United States in an official capacity, his staff informed him that if the issue of the Khemlani loan were not dealt with, it would most likely overshadow his visit. This, plus Cairns' pre-existing reservations about the loan, prompted him to discuss the issue once again with Whitlam, who then agreed that Connor's dealings with Khemlani should come to an end. Cairns delivered the news to Connor at Whitlam’s request. Connor was later dismissed by Whitlam for continuing his unauthorised business communications with Khemlani.[1][9]Whitlam moved Cairns from Treasury to the Environment ministry.
Cairns' political undoing began with an incident that is often conflated with the Connor/Khemlani dealings but was essentially separate. In 1974, Cairns was introduced by Robert Menzies toGeorge Harris,a Melbourne businessman and president of theCarlton Football Club.[10]Harris had offered to secure loan funds for the Australian government, and in March 1975 Cairns signed a letter agreeing to a 2.5% commission. When Cairns gave a misleading statement in June to Parliament that he had not authorised any such commission, many blamed the disorganised state of Cairns’ office. Cairns claimed that he had signed the letter in question unknowingly while signing a batch of fifty or so letters and that it was not an uncommon practice for politicians to sign letters that they had little or no memory of signing. Ironically, opposition politicians, includingMalcolm Fraserand a number of his ministers, spoke out in defence of Cairns, agreeing that they too signed letters of which they had little or no memory. However, since Cairns had signed the letter, Whitlam dismissed him from the ministry on 2 July 1975. Cairns has since stated that he felt there were ulterior motives at play on the part of Gough Whitlam; namely that Whitlam wished to be rid of Cairns because Cairns did not agree with a policy of economic rationalism and that Whitlam felt that Cairns was a threat to his leadership.[1][9]
Cairns and Morosi
editIn late 1974 Cairns metJunie Morosiwho had worked forAl Grassbyand Lionel Murphy. Morosi greatly admired Cairns from having read his academic writings and she introduced Cairns to the work ofWilhelm Reich,opening his mind to the relevance of human psychology as it related to social change.[1]Cairns decided to offer Morosi a position as his principal private secretary and the pair began an affair.[1][11]
On 2 December 1974, the media reported Cairns' employment offer to Morosi. The reports highlighted Morosi's lack of public service experience, past business failures, her physical beauty and pointed out that she had often been seen dining in Canberra with senior Cabinet ministers. As a result, Cairns and Morosi announced that she would not take Cairns' offer of employment. The Liberal Opposition called for a senate inquiry. An investigation found there was no evidence of impropriety on the part of Morosi or of no preferential treatment being given to Morosi. On 13 December, it was reported that Morosi would accept Cairns' offer of employment.[11]
During the Australian Labor Party's National Conference in February 1975, Cairns gave an interview to a reporter in which he spoke of "a kind of love" for Morosi, reigniting the controversy. The press continued to speculate about the affair. During the 1975 National Conference, a photographer hid in a tree and waited while Morosi, her husband, Cairns, and his wife were having breakfast on a balcony. This photographer took a photo just when Cairns’ wife left the balcony and with Morosi's husband out of shot.The Daily Telegraphran the picture of Cairns and Morosi the next day with the headline "Breakfast with Junie". Allegations were made in the House and the Senate. Accusations of misconduct were made by a variety of institutions.[11]
In 1982, Morosi took2UEandThe Daily Mirrorto court on defamation charges, with both Cairns and Morosi denying the accusations of sexual impropriety and corruption.[11]In the Supreme Court of New South Wales, Cairns denied under oath having had a sexual relationship with Morosi.[citation needed]The jury in that case found that the article in question did contain "an imputation" that Cairns was "improperly involved with his assistant, Junie Morosi, in a romantic or sexual association", but that this statement was not defamatory. Cairns did not receive compensation, although Morosi did.[citation needed]
On ABC radio in September 2002, Cairns admitted for the first time that he had a sexual relationship with Junie Morosi.[12][13]Four years earlier, referring to his decision to employ Morosi and the ensuing media storm that it created — Cairns said that "looking back over it, it was a mistake on my part".[1]
Aftermath
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In 1977 Cairns retired from Parliament. He devoted the next portion of his life to theCounterculturemovement, to which he had been introduced by Morosi. He sponsored a series ofDown to Earthconference-festivals, known asConFests,at various rural locations, and was photographed taking part in Counterculture inspired activities, such as meditation. In 1979, Cairns severed his formal links with the Down to Earth organizers. Cairns kept in contact with Morosi and the two remained friends.
Cairns was subject to a great deal of media ridicule for these activities, but displayed his usual firm conviction about the rightness of his causes. In his later years he lived atNarre Warren Eastnear Melbourne. He sold his books outside suburban markets, where he would talk about politics, history or his life.
In 1983, Cairns made an unsuccessful run for the Senate as an independent and won 0.5% of the vote. Although he had not resigned from the ALP when he made his independent Senate run, the Labor Party did not expel him and remained a party member until he let his party membership lapsed in 1991 but rejoined the party in 1996.[14]
In 2000 he was made a Life Member of the Labor Party. Cairns died of bronchialpneumonia,aged 89, in October 2003. He was accorded a State Funeral at St John's Anglican Church inToorak.
Personal life
editCairns married Gwen Robb in 1939. He adopted Robb's two sons by her previous marriage, Barry and Phillip when they were 4 and 5 years old respectively.[1]Cairns claimed no religious affiliation. In a 1998 interview, he said: "I have never believed myself to be anything that I can attach a name to. I was not a Christian. I did not regard myself as a humanist or a socialist. I was something: what I am, and it did not have a name".[1]
Bibliography
edit- Cairns, G. O. & Cairns, J. F.,Australia,1953
- Cairns, J. F.,Socialism and the A.L.P.,comment by Bruce McFarlane, 1963
- Cairns, J. F.,Living with Asia,1965
- Cairns, J. F.,Vietnam: is it truth we want?,1965
- Cairns, J. F.,Economics and foreign policy,1966
- Cairns, J. F.,Here I stand: statements,1966
- Cairns, J. F.,Changing Australia's role in Asia,1968
- Cairns, J. F.,Australian foreign policy,1968
- Cairns, J. F.,Eagle and the lotus; western intervention in Vietnam 1847-1968,1969
- Cairns, J. F. & Cairns M.P.,Silence kills; events leading up to the Vietnam Moratorium,8 May 1970
- Cairns, J. F.,Eagle and the lotus: Western intervention in Vietnam, 1847-1971,1971
- Cairns, J. F.,Tariffs or planning?: the case for reassessment,1971
- Cairns, J. F.,Quiet revolution,1972
- Cairns, J. F.,Impossible attainment,1974
- Cairns, J. F.,Labor Party? Dr. Evatt - the Petrov affair - the Whitlam government.,1974
- Cairns, Jim,Vietnam: scorched earth reborn,1976
- Cairns, Jim,Oil in troubled waters,1976
- Cairns, Jim,Growth to freedom,1979
- Cairns, Jim,Survival now: the human transformation,1982
- Cairns, Jim,Human growth, its source and potential,1984
- Cairns, Jim,Strength within: towards an end to violence,1988
- Cairns, Jim,Towards a new society: a new day has begun,1990–1993
- Cairns, Jim,Untried road,1990
- Cairns, Jim,Reshaping the future: liberated human potential,1996
- Cairns, Jim,On the horizon: a cultural transformation to a new consciousness,1999
- Cairns, Jim,Liberated biological function: the source of human quality,2001
- Cairns, Jim,New day: liberated biological human potential: the source of social reform to the good society there's no other way,2002
- Heffernan, Jack,Socialist alternative: an A.L.P. view,foreword by J.F. Cairns, 1969
References
edit- ^abcdefghijklmnopqrsFilm Australia (1998)."Australian Biography project interview – Jim Cairns".The Australian Biography project.National Film and Sound Archive, Commonwealth of Australia.Retrieved19 February2022.
- ^Carr, Bob, "How Gough Carried The Can For Progress", Sunday Telegraph (Sydney, Australia) 26 October 2014
- ^Ormonde, Paul (1981).A Foolish Passionate Man: A Biography of Jim Cairns.Ringwood, VIC, Australia: Penguin Books. p. 95.ISBN0-140059-75-X.
- ^Ormonde, Paul (1981).A Foolish Passionate Man: A Biography of Jim Cairns.Ringwood, VIC, Australia: Penguin Books. pp. 95–96.ISBN0-140059-75-X.
- ^Strangio, Paul (2002).Keeper of the Faith: A Biography of Jim Cairns.Carlton South, VIC, Australia: Melbourne University Publishing. p. 179.ISBN0-522850-02-2.
- ^"Trade Practices/Tobacco documents/Jim Cairns biography".ABC Radio National. 9 May 2002.Retrieved21 June2021.
- ^"Labor sticks to old team".The Canberra Times.11 June 1974.
- ^Coventry, CJ.Origins of the Royal Commission on Intelligence and Security(2018: MA thesis submitted at UNSW).
- ^ab"The loans affair, 1974–75 – Fact sheet 239".National Archives of Australia.Retrieved17 December2011.
- ^Harris & Main (2006) pp. 149-176
- ^abcdLaing, Kate."'A Kind of Love': Supergirls, Scapegoats and Sexual Liberation "(PDF).University of Sydney.Retrieved18 December2011.
- ^Richard Ackland (20 September 2002)."Cairns admits sex, and breathtaking hypocrisy".Sydney Morning Herald.Retrieved25 June2010.
- ^Annabel Crabb (16 September 2002)."Cairns admits Morosi affair".The Age.Retrieved25 June2010.
- ^John Robert Hawkins (July 2014)."Jim Cairns: The Dreamer"– viaResearchGate.
Sources
edit- Film Australia (1998),"Jim Cairns",Australian Biography,National Film and Sound archive, Commonwealth of Australia,retrieved25 June2010
- Harris, George&Main, Jim(2006).George - by George: Changi, the Blues and Beyond.Melbourne, Victoria: Bas Publishing.ISBN1-920910-67-0.
{{cite book}}:CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
Further reading
edit- Dowsing, Irene (1971),Jim Cairns MHR,Acacia Press, Blackburn, Victoria.ISBN0-85808-005-2
- Ormonde, Paul (1981),A Foolish Passionate Man,Penguin, Ringwood, Victoria.ISBN014005975X
- Strangio, Paul (2002),Keeper of the Faith,Melbourne University Press, Carlton, Victoria.ISBN0-522-85002-2