Preceded by New seat Preceded by Edward Heitmann Party Australian Labor Party Succeeded by Edward Heitmann Role Australian Politician | Preceded by Charles Frazer Name Hugh Mahon Succeeded by Division abolished Succeeded by George Foley | |
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Died August 28, 1931, Ringwood, Melbourne, Australia | ||
Expulsion of hugh mahon
Hugh Mahon (6 January 1857 – 28 August 1931) was an Irish-born Australian politician and a member of the first Commonwealth Parliament for the Australian Labor Party. He was the only Member of Parliament ever expelled from the Federal Parliament.
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Mahon was born at Killurin, near Tullamore, King's County, Ireland and migrated with his family to the United States in 1867, where he learnt about printing. He returned to Ireland in about 1880 and was jailed in 1881 for political agitation along with Irish National Land League leaders including Charles Stewart Parnell, but was released due to ill-health. He migrated to Australia in 1882 to avoid re-arrest and worked for newspapers in Goulburn and Sydney, before acquiring a newspaper in Gosford. He married Mary Alice L'Estrange in 1888 and subsequently sold his newspaper to follow her back to her birthplace, Melbourne. In 1895, he moved to Coolgardie, Western Australia.
Political career
In 1897 Mahon stood unsuccessfully for the state seat of North Coolgardie and the following year he was appointed editor of the Kalgoorlie Sun, a salacious newspaper similar to John Norton’s Truth, in which he regularly denounced the Forrest government for alleged corrupt practices. Mahon’s notoriety as a fighting editor helped him to win the new federal seat of Coolgardie at the 1901 election for Labour. He was Postmaster-General in the Watson government in 1904 and Minister for Home Affairs in the Fisher government of 1908–09. In 1913, the seat of Coolgardie was abolished and partly replaced by Dampier, for which he stood unsuccessfully. He re-entered Parliament in the seat of Kalgoorlie; following the death of the incumbent, Charles Frazer, a by-election was called, but at the close of nominations on 22 December 1913 Mahon was the sole candidate and was declared elected unopposed. He became Minister for External Affairs in December 1914 until the Labor Party split in 1916.
Mahon lost his seat in 1917, but won it back in 1919. After the death in October 1920 of the Irish nationalist Terence McSwiney, who had been on hunger strike, Mahon attacked British policy in Ireland and the British Empire, referring to it as "this bloody and accursed despotism" at an open-air meeting in Melbourne on 7 November. Prime Minister Billy Hughes moved to expel him and on 12 November the House of Representatives passed a resolution that Mahon had made "seditious and disloyal utterances at a public meeting," and was "guilty of conduct unfitting him to remain a member of this House and inconsistent with the oath of allegiance which he has taken as a member of this House". Mahon became the only MP ever to be expelled from the Federal Parliament, since, under Section 8 of the Parliamentary Privileges Act, 1987, neither house of the Parliament now has the power to expel a member.
Mahon failed to win back his seat at the December 1920 Kalgoorlie by-election, suffering a 3.5 percent swing.
After a trip to Europe and Ireland, Mahon died in 1931 in the Melbourne suburb of Ringwood, and was survived by his wife and four children.