History
Prior to 1901, Australia was a collection of colonies answerable to the United Kingdom. The oldest among these, New South Wales, had been established in 1788. With Federation in 1901, a new entity, the Commonwealth of Australia, was created by an Act of the British Parliament. The system of government for the Commonwealth was a federation, with a federal, Commonwealth government being the national government. The former colonies were converted into States, sub-national sovereign entities whose governments retained plenary power within their own territories, except where power has been assigned to the Commonwealth by the Constitution. Some of the non-integral territories of the former colonies, such as the Northern Territory of South Australia, were handed over to the Commonwealth. The Constitution also provided for the power of the federal government to create further territories in future.
Read more about this topic: Australian Governments
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“The awareness that health is dependent upon habits that we control makes us the first generation in history that to a large extent determines its own destiny.”
—Jimmy Carter (James Earl Carter, Jr.)
“Humankind has understood history as a series of battles because, to this day, it regards conflict as the central facet of life.”
—Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (1860–1904)
“Certainly there is not the fight recorded in Concord history, at least, if in the history of America, that will bear a moment’s comparison with this, whether for the numbers engaged in it, or for the patriotism and heroism displayed.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)