William Lyne

Sir William John Lyne KCMG (6 April 1844 – 3 August 1913) was an Australian politician who served as Premier of New South Wales from 1899 to 1901, and later as a federal cabinet minister under Edmund Barton and Alfred Deakin. He is best known as the subject of the so called "Hopetoun Blunder", unexpectedly being asked to serve as the first Prime Minister of Australia but proving unable to form a government.

Lyne was born in

Lyne was born at Great Swanport, Van Diemen's Land (what is now Swansea, Tasmania). He was the eldest son of John Lyne, a pastoral farmer who would serve in the Tasmanian House of Assembly from 1880 to 1893.^[1] He was educated at Horton College, Ross, and subsequently by a private tutor.

In the mid 1860s, he left

Lyne was the member for Hume in the New South Wales Legislative Assembly from 1880. A Protectionist, he was Secretary for Public Works in 1885 and from 1886 to 1887 and Secretary for Lands in 1889.^[4] From 1891 to 1894, he became Secretary for Public Works again in the third ministry of George Dibbs. Lyne was a strong protectionist and fought hard for a high tariff. He also strongly supported railway expansion and pressed on with the building of the Culcairn to Corowa line in his own electorate.^[5]

In the constitutional debates of the 1890s Lyne favoured unification of the Australian colonies over their federation. He was one of the representatives of New South Wales at the 1897-8 convention, and sat on its finance committee, but was absent from 49 percent of its divisions, the worst record of any delegate but one.[7] He publicly advocated No in the referendum of 1898, and in the second referendum of 1899, the only New South Wales convention representative still dissatisfied with the amended bill. George Reid, the premier, had declared himself whole-heartedly on the side of federation, and the second referendum showed a substantial majority on the "Yes" side.^[3] Lyne protested the contamination of the result by ballot fraud, but soon reconciled himself to the new political reality.^[8]

Federal politics

As Premier of the largest colony, Lyne considered himself entitled to be the first Prime Minister of Australia when the colonies federated in January 1901. This was in accordance with the precedent established at Canadian Confederation three decades earlier.

The

In April 1907 Lyne accompanied Deakin to the colonial conference and endeavoured to persuade the British politicians that they were foolish in clinging to their policy of free trade. Deakin and Lyne returned to Australia in June, and when Sir John Forrest resigned his position as Treasurer at the end of July 1907, Lyne succeeded him.^[3]

Lyne's name is associated with the 'Lyne Tariff'— the Customs Tariff Act of 1908—which significantly increased levels of protection for local industry.^[9] It represented the final triumph of politicians favouring protection, over those advocating free trade, and brought to an end the main political divergence of pre-Federation Australia.

Fusion government

In November 1908, the Labor party withdrew its support from Deakin, and

Sir William Lyne died in the Sydney suburb of Double Bay, in 1913. He was survived by one son and three daughters of the first marriage and by his second wife and her daughter.^[3] On 8 April 1960, Lady Sarah Lyne presented a lithograph portraying the opening of the first Federal Parliament to the then newly opened Lyneham High School.^[10] Lady Lyne died in Canberra in 1961 and is buried in Woden Cemetery.^[11]

Assessment

The 1949 Dictionary of Australian Biography assessed Lyne as:^[3]

Lyne was more of a politician than a statesman, always inclined to take a somewhat narrow view of politics. He did some good work when Premier of New South Wales by putting through the Early Closing bill (regulating shopping hours), the Industrial Arbitration bill, and bringing in graduated death duties; but even these measures were part of his bargain with the Labor party.

He was tall and vigorous, in his younger days a typical Australian bushman. He knew everyone in his electorate and was a good friend to all. He was bluff and frank and it was said of him that he was a man whose hand went instinctively into his pocket when any appeal was made to him. In Parliament, he was courageous and a vigorous administrator.

Scarcely an orator, he was a good tactician. Although overshadowed by greater men like Barton, Reid and Deakin, his views had much influence in his time. In his early political life he was a great advocate of irrigation, and in federal politics he had much to do with the shaping of the policy of protection eventually adopted by the Commonwealth.

His reputation has been sullied by Alfred Deakin's description of him as "a crude, sleek, suspicious, blundering, short-sighted, backblocks politician".^[12]

Lyne was also largely responsible for pushing through Parliament the bounty scheme that brought the Thylacine (Tasmanian tiger) to its extinction. In extensive reviews of the bounty scheme payments and official sheep farming records, Lyne's insistence of the threat posed by the native marsupial to sheep seems to have been largely at odds with the facts.^[13]

Honours

Lyne was created a