Joseph Cook

Infobox Prime Minister
honorific-prefix = The Right Honourable
name=Sir Joseph Cook

honorific-suffix = GCMG


order=6th Prime Minister of Australia
Elections: 1913, 1914
term_start =24 June 1913
term_end =17 September 1914
predecessor =Andrew Fisher
successor =Andrew Fisher
birth_date =birth date|1860|12|7|df=y
birth_place =Silverdale, England
death_date =death date and age|1947|7|30|1860|12|7|df=y
death_place =Sydney
party=Labor, Free Trade/Anti-Socialist, Fusion
constituency = Parramatta (New South Wales)

:"For the actor Joe Cook see Joe Cook (actor)".

Sir Joseph Cook, GCMG (7 December 1860 – 30 July 1947) was an Australian politician and sixth Prime Minister of Australia. [cite web | title = Prime Facts 6 | work = Old Parliament House | publisher = The Australian Prime Ministers Centre | url = http://www.apmc.oph.gov.au/lib/docs/06%20Cook%20Web.pdf | doi = | accessdate = 2008-08-20 ]

Early years

Cook was born in Silverdale, a small mining town near Newcastle-under-Lyme in Staffordshire, England. He had no formal education and worked in the coal mines from the age of nine. He married Mary Turner in 1885 and shortly after emigrated to New South Wales.

Cook settled in Lithgow and worked in the coal mines, becoming General-Secretary of the Western Miners Association in 1887. In 1888, he participated in demonstrations against Chinese immigration.cite web
first=F. K.
last=Crowley
title =Cook, Sir Joseph (1860 - 1947)
publisher =Australian National University
work=Australian Dictionary of Biography
url =http://www.adb.online.anu.edu.au/biogs/A080108b.htm
accessdate = 2007-04-03] He was also active in the Single Tax League and was a founding member of the Australian Labor Party in 1891.cite web
title =Joseph Cook
work =Australia's Prime Ministers
publisher =National Archives of Australia
url =http://primeministers.naa.gov.au/meetpm.asp?pmId=7
accessdate = 2007-04-03 ]

Political career

Cook was elected to the New South Wales Legislative Assembly as MP for the coalfields seat of Hartley in 1891, in Labor's first big breakthrough in Australian politics.cite web
title =Sir Joseph Cook (1860 - 1947)
work =Members of Parliament
publisher =Parliament of New South Wales
url =http://www.parliament.nsw.gov.au/prod/parlment/members.nsf/1fb6ebed995667c2ca256ea100825164/77b6d8e9dac60798ca256cbe001358a5!OpenDocument
accessdate = 2007-04-03 ] It was the first time Labor had won a seat in any parliament in Australia. In 1894, however, Cook was the leader of the group who refused to accept the Labor Party's decision to make all members sign a "pledge" to be bound by decisions of the Parliamentary Labor Party (Caucus). He left the party and became a follower of George Reid's Free Trade Party. He was a minister in Reid's government from 1894 to 1899.

Federal Parliament

When the first federal Parliament was elected in 1901, Cook was elected, unopposed by Labor, member for Parramatta, a seat which then included the Lithgow area. He became Reid's deputy, but did not hold office in Reid's 1904-05 ministry, mainly because Reid needed to offer portfolios to independent Protectionist members. When Reid retired from the party leadership in 1908, Cook agreed to merge the Free Traders with Alfred Deakin's Protectionists, and became deputy leader of the new "Commonwealth Liberal Party".

Cook served as Defence Minister in Deakin's 1909-1910 ministry, then succeeded Deakin as Liberal leader when the government was defeated by Labor in the 1910 elections. He had by this time become completely philosophically opposed to socialism.

Prime Minister

.

Unfortunately for Cook, World War I broke out in the middle of the election campaign for the September 1914 election. Fisher was able to remind the voters that it was Labor which had favoured an independent Australian defence force, which the conservatives had opposed. Cook was defeated and Fisher resumed office.

Nationalist Party

In 1916 the Labor government split when Fisher's successor, Billy Hughes, tried to introduce conscription. Cook agreed to become Hughes's deputy in the new Nationalist Party, and became Minister for the Navy in Hughes's government. The Nationalists had huge victories in the 1917 and 1919 elections. Cook was part of the Australian delegation at the Paris Peace Conference where he defended the White Australia Policy and supported Australia's annexation of German New Guinea. He was Treasurer (finance minister) 1920-21.

Cook resigned from Parliament in 1921 and was appointed Australian High Commissioner in London, where he served until 1927. In 1928–1929 he headed the Royal Commission into South Australia as affected by Federation. He died in Sydney in 1947, aged 86.

Honours

Cook was appointed to the Privy Council on 16 July 1914. [LondonGazette|issue=28850|startpage=5539|date=17 July 1914|accessdate=2007-12-17] He was knighted in 1918 as Knight Grand Cross of the Order of St Michael and St George (GCMG). [LondonGazette|issue=30831|supp=yes|startpage=9264|date=6 August 1918|accessdate=2007-12-17]

ee also

*Cook Ministry

Notes

Further reading

*G Bebbington, "Pit Boy to Prime Minister", University of Keele, no date (quite rare but the only attempt at a Cook biography to date)

Persondata
NAME=Cook, Joseph
ALTERNATIVE NAMES=
SHORT DESCRIPTION=Australian politician
DATE OF BIRTH=7 December 1860
PLACE OF BIRTH=Silverdale, Staffordshire, England
DATE OF DEATH=30 July 1947
PLACE OF DEATH=Sydney, Australia