J. D. B. MILLER. Australian Government and Politics: An Introductory Survey. Pp. 240. London: Gerald Duckworth and Company, 1954. 15 s
| Author | Mary E. Murphy |
| DOI | 10.1177/000271625530000162 |
| Published date | 01 July 1955 |
| Date | 01 July 1955 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
165
The
great
bulk
of
the
correspondence
concerns
Defoe’s
relationship
with
his
bene-
factor
Robert
Harley,
Speaker
of
the
House
and
later
Lord
Treasurer
and
Earl
of
Ox-
ford.
From
1703,
when
Harley
saved
De-
foe
from
prison,
up
to
the
death
of
Queen
Anne
in
1714,
Defoe
wrote
Harley
long
ac-
counts
depicting
conditions
in
England
and
Scotland.
Defoe
described
his
unique
po-
sition
as
Harley’s
man
thus:
&dquo;Methinks
I
look
Very
Simply
when
to
my
Self
I
re-
flect
how
I
am
your
Messenger
without
an
Errand,
your
Ambassador
without
Instruc-
tions,
your
Servant
without
Orders&dquo;
(p.
131).
In
his
own
mind
he
carried
out
Harley’s
tasks
well:
&dquo;In
my
Mannagemt
here
I
am
a
perfect
Emissary.
I
act
the
old
part
of
Cardinal
Richlieu.
I
have
my
spyes
and
my
Pensioners
In
Every
Place&dquo;
(p.
211).
Political
scientists
will
read
with
profit
and
pleasure
Defoe’s
ideas
on
the
prime
ministership
as
it
had
developed
histori-
cally,
his
thoughts
on
naval
affairs
and
naval
administration,
his
penetrating
judg-
ments
and
descriptions
of
the
violent
party
warfare
that
was
so
prevalent
in
eighteenth-
century
political
life,
his
stand
on
freedom
of
the
press
and
of
conscience,
and
his
in-
sights
into
the
duties
of
a
British
secretary
of
state
and
into
the
operation
of
the
Brit-
ish
electoral
system.
For
the
historian,
the
letters
will
be
complementary
to
De-
foe’s
History
of
the
Union
and
an
invalu-
able
source
for
Dissenter
attitudes
toward
the
leading
issues
of
the
day.
His
ob-
servations
on
foreign
affairs
are
expressed
to
better
purpose
in
the
Review
or
in
his
pamphlets.
Economists
will
discover
his
economic
digressions,
especially
his
project
for
advancing
Scottish
trade
and
for
found-
ing
a
colony
in
Chili,
to
be
both
interest-
ing
and
enlightening.
Literature
students
will
find
the
notes
and
letters
most
valu-
able
in
their
quest
to
fathom
the
doings
and
the
character
of
the
author
of
the
True
Born
Englishman
and
Robinson
Crusoe.
The
editorial
effort
expended
by
Profes-
sor
Healey
has
made
the
book
highly
us-
able.
The
text
is
lucid
and
the
index
full.
A
bibliography
would
perhaps
have
added
to
the
value
of
the
work.
This
is
of
course
a
minor
criticism.
Professor
Healey’s
edi-
tion
of
The
Letters
of
Daniel
Defoe
hence-
forth
will
be
consulted
by
all
students
in-
terested
in
Queen
Anne’s
England.
JOHN
J.
MURRAY
Coe
College
J.
D.
B.
MILLER.
Australian
Government
and
Politics:
An
Introductory
Survey.
Pp.
240.
London:
Gerald
Duckworth
and
Company,
1954.
15
s.
Australia’s
rise
in
national
unity
and
in-
ternational
prestige
has
been
beset
with
many
difficulties,
as
the
volume
by
J.
D.
B.
Miller,
assistant
lecturer
in
international
relations
at
the
London
School
of
Eco-
nomics,
amply
demonstrates.
The
reviewer
spent
eight
months
in
Australia
in
1953
as
a
Fulbright
professor.
To
the
visitor,
and
perhaps
to
a
certain
extent
to
the
citizen,
Australian
political
life
presents
a
bewil-
dering
variety
of
institutions:
three
tiers
of
government
and
a
multitude
of
statutory
bodies.
There
are
thirteen
Houses
of
Par-
liament
and
680
Members
of
Parliament
to
govern
nine
million
people.
Some-
times
these
facts
are
quoted
to
prove
that
Australia
is
over-governed.
But
part
of
the
reason
for
the
elaborate
framework
of
government
&dquo;lies
in
the
inhospitable
na-
ture
of
the
country,&dquo;
Mr.
Miller
argues,
&dquo;in
the
remoteness
of
one
center
of
popu-
lation
from
another,
and
the
sparseness
of
population
between
the
main
centers;
the
political
expression
of
this
has
been
the
demand
of
the
faraway
areas
for
special
representation
in
their
local
parliaments,
equal
representation
in
the
Senate,
and
a
place
at
the
Premiers’
Conference.&dquo;
There
are
three
Australian
political
par-
ties
which
have
been
significant
in
any
of
the
parliaments-Labor,
Liberal,
and
Coun-
try-and
only
one
outside
parliaments-
the
Communist
Party.
One
feature
which
all
of
the
parties
display
and
which
distin-
guishes
them
from
British
political
parties
is
that
they
are
organized
primarily
at
the
state
level,
and
only
secondarily
at
the
national
level.
Each
party,
in
fact,
&dquo;has
reproduced
the
Federal
pattern
on
which
the
present
governmental
system
is
based,
in
that
each
began
as a
series
of
independ-
ent
State
organizations
which
created
a
na-
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