Edward Gough Whitlam's Letter of Passion!

by Peter Botsman

What would a 29 year old flight lieutenant navigator be passionately writing to his beloved on a Saturday evening from the deep north of Australia in 1944?

423371 F/O E.G. Whitlam
Group 679, AAA7
Townsville
Saturday evening 22 July '44

Darling,

Thank you for the news of the day, devoured, with special titbits left to be enjoyed at a later time. We're about to do some "work", but life goes on... Then comes a joke "We continue to mix our drinks - malted milk, coffee (essence) and mostly cocoa".

Also note: "I've sent in my income tax returns, and gave my address as 4 Roslyn Rd. In a month or two expect a notice."

So far, a typical letter from an airman writing home. Veiled references to "work", the business of war, designed not to overly dwell on the matters of life or death confronting every airman on each mission north.

But then the passion begins and something of the extraordinary quality of this 29 year old starts to emerge. The letter comes to us from Laurie Oakes, Whitlam biographer, the Nine Network's Political Editor and one of the most important of our Canberra political correspondents. It is of course a letter from the youthful E.G. Whitlam to wife Margaret. Laurie had gathered materials for his biography of Whitlam in 1974 and he found the old letter in a box of primary materials he had gathered in April of this year. Thanks to his storage system the letter looks like it was written yesterday.

In his article for The Bulletin on April 16, 2002, Oakes wrote that even at this early stage in his life and before he joined the Labor Pary, Gough's reformist zeal shines through. "What Flying Officer Whitlam ..wrote about with passion to his young wife thousands of kilometres away was a referendum campaign"!

John Curtin was campaigning for greater powers for the Commonwealth in post war reconstruction. Our young letter writer in mock speech to Margaret asks: 'Can we afford to have bureaucracies and committees of the size of the war effort in every State of the country?'

'Could the Commonwealth fail to do a better job than the States at such a time of crisis?' and in conclusion: "You can hardly fail to see that the Commonwealth is better fitted to deal with such nation-wide problems. And so to bed. Love, G. {Authorised by E.G. Whitlam, above address}"

A special letter, that foreshadows the destiny of the man.

But in his article for The Bulletin Oakes also observes how different things are today.

"What struck me as I read the letter - part of material I gathered when I was writing a biography ofWhitlam in 1974 -was that no one has such enthusiasm for constitutional reform these days. Or any enthusiasm at all, it seems. Sure, some people get excited about the republic. But when it comes to changes that make government more efficient and effective, there is an almost universal lack of interest.

Yet there are reforms worth trying for. One that springs to mind is a constitutional change to increase the term of federal parliament. Most politicians acknowledge that three-year term works against good government, especially since prime ministers often go to the polls early. After that it is back in election mode.

Four-year terms are now the norm at state level, and there is support, in principle for a similar change federally. Howard said last year" "Look, in the past I've supported four-year parliaments ... You can afford to sort of invest in something that has short term difficulty to give you a long term gain. ... From a governance point of view, there's probably a lot going for it." The Australian Democrats advocate a fixed four year electoral cycle. Spokesperson on electoral matters, Andrew Murray, said a few months ago: "The advantage of fixed four-year terms for a government is that they allow enough time for a policy agenda to be fully implemented. The advantage for opposition parties is that an election can't just be called because the government of the day feels it is in a winning position." Howard, though, says: "I think it should remain the prerogative of the prime minister of the day to choose the election date". A reasonable compromise would be the Victorian model, where the Legislative Assembly has four year terms and cannot be dissolved in the first three years unless there are special circumstances.

But politicians of all stripes are wary because they remember the last attempt. In 1988, Bob Hawke's government put four referendum questions to the people, one of which would have increased the House of Representatives' term to four years. The sticking point for then-opposition leader Howard was that it would also have shortened the term of senators. With the Coalition opposed, the referendum went down to humiliating defeat. It will take someone with Whitlamesque zeal to arouse interest in another referendum. Ron Walker, who will move for four-year terms at this week's Liberal federal council, may have that zeal. Meanwhile, I will forward this yellowing, three-page letter to its rightful owners to be added, perhaps, to the collection of personal papers and photographs now kept at the University of Western Sydney's Whitlam Institute.

Laurie Oakes, The Bulletin, April 16, 2002, p. 17

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This month a new display of the extraordinary letter written by the young E.G. Whitlam to his wife Margaret begins in the Whitlam Reading Room from June 13. Click here for a copy of Laurie Oakes' Keynote Address from the launch. To view the 'Letter of Passion' as well as other books donated by Mr. Whitlam please feel free to visit the Whitlam Reading Room 10am - 4pm weekdays at the University of Western Sydney.

For further reading, also see: Oakes, Laurie, and Soloman, David H. The Making of an Australian Prime Minister. Melbourne: Cheshire, 1973; Oakes, Laurie, Farmer, Richard, and MacCallum, Mungo. Whitlam and Frost: The Full Text of Their TV Conversations Plus Exclusive New Interviews. London: Sundial, 1974; Oakes, Laurie. Crash Through or Crash: The Unmaking of a Prime Minister. Melbourne: Drummond, 1976 and Oakes, Laurie. Whitlam PM: A Biography. Sydney: Angus and Robertson, 1973.