Federation of Australia - Early Constitutional Conventions

Early Constitutional Conventions

In the early 1890s two meetings established the need for federation and set the framework for this to occur. An informal meeting attended by official representatives from the Australasian colonies was held in 1890. This led to the first National Australasian Convention, meeting in Sydney in 1891. New Zealand was represented at both the conference and the Convention, although its delegates expressed that it would be unlikely to join the Federation at its foundation, but it would likely be interested in doing so at a later date.