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.
Contents
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?
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.