Menzies’ humble upbringing and his pitch to “the forgotten people” allowed him to strike a chord with aspirational Australians who returned him to office at seven elections.

But while many still view Menzies as our greatest prime minister, his long reign was aided by the division of his opposition.

The split of the Labor Party in 1955 — when socially conservative Catholics formed the Democratic Labor Party — resigned the ALP to Opposition for more than two decades.

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In Victoria and Queensland, Labor didn’t return to office until 1982 and 1989 respectively.

There’s a lesson worth learning here for conservatives in the Northern Territory.

The wounds inflicted during the Country Liberal Party’s last term in office are yet to heal. And these festering sores threaten to condemn those on the right to Opposition for an extended period.

Attempts to patch over the scars of the past have thus far proved futile.

As Terry Mills and Robyn Lambley toyed with joining the Nationals just before Christmas in 2018, CLP president Ron Kelly had a strong message for those on the conservative side of politics.

They needed to band together, Kelly argued, to capture the “anybody-but-Labor” vote.

“I would guess that at the moment the anybody-but-Labor vote would be 60-40 against Labor,” he said.

“My view is that we need to focus our attention on what is a common enemy, which is Labor.

“How many more empty shopfronts do we have to see, how many more businesses have to be forced to lay off staff just before Christmas, how many more kids have to escape from prison before we realise our prisons are not what we want them to be?”

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But actions speak louder than words, and at the Johnston by-election in February Kelly’s “anybody-but-Labor” mantra somehow resulted in the CLP putting Labor second on its how-to-vote cards.

Its hand, admittedly, had been forced after Mills’ new Territory Alliance Party did a preference deal with The Greens.

Confounding even Kelly’s 2018 prediction, Labor’s primary vote in a traditionally safe seat at that by-election was just 29 per cent.

But it still won — saving Chief Minister Michael Gunner’s job — because the CLP and Territory Alliance were more interested in fighting one another than the traditional enemy.

For many in the CLP, the decision to preference Labor was a betrayal of the party’s values.

For Territory Alliance it’s harder to determine exactly what those values are.

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When Mills signed his former nemesis and ex-Labor leader Delia Lawrie as a policy adviser last month, one of the wiser observers of Territory politics remarked that Territory Alliance looked like the party of axes to grind.

Mills is clearly driven in part by a desire to right the injustice he believes he was the victim of during his brief stint as CLP chief minister.

And Lawrie — like her friend and former Labor-turned-Territory Alliance MLA Jeff Collins — would no doubt take great pleasure in seeing the fall of Michael Gunner.

Yet Territory Alliance has managed to put forward some solid policies.

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The CLP is expected to lay out its policy agenda as early as Monday.

It’s done well to rebuild its image after the disaster of 2016 and has preselected some high profile candidates including former NT Cattlemen’s Association chief executive Tracey Hayes, Barkly mayor Steve Edgington and Alice Springs mayor Damien Ryan.

It’s difficult however, to see the CLP forming a majority in its own right.

This presents a quandary.

Some in the party might see 2020 as an opportunity for the CLP to lance the Mills boil once and for all.

Without CLP preferences Mills is no guarantee to even hold his own seat, let alone win others.

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The CLP could win seven or eight seats, form a solid opposition (without the irritation of Territory Alliance) and set themselves for a real crack in 2024.

The danger here is they would guarantee Labor another term in office, and as we’ve seen through the coronavirus crisis, fortunes can change quickly in politics.

They also risk further alienating a section of their membership already smarting of the Johnston debacle.

The alternative is to take Kelly’s original advice.

For the “anybody-but-Labor” forces to bury the hatchet and try to tread the narrow path to an August election victory.

Students of political history will know their fate if they fail to do so.