An unforgettable Remembrance Day

From the moment it was revealed, the Dismissal divided families, workplaces, classrooms, communities and newspapers, including this one

“Write something for the ages,” The Australian’s most senior political correspondent, Paul Kelly, then 28, told himself as he started to write our front page story about 7pm on the night of November 11, 1975. He did. It began: “The nation faces elections for both Houses of federal parliament on December 13 after the 21st Prime Minister, Gough Whitlam, was dismissed yesterday by the Governor-General, Sir John Kerr.” It was “the most astonishing Remembrance Day since the Great War”, Kelly recalls in The Weekend Magazine. Our most serious political and constitutional crisis is etched indelibly in the memories of Australians over 60; younger generations continue to discover it in awe, informed 50 years on by Kelly, now the paper’s editor-at-large, and Troy Bramston, Whitlam’s definitive biographer.

The Whitlam Dismissal, 50 years on

‘I saw journalists with their hands shaking’: Paul Kelly recalls the Dismissal

For the first time in 50 years, The Australian’s editor-at-large Paul Kelly gives his forensic account of the day the Governor-General sacked a Prime Minister.

From Whitlam to Albanese: the remaking of Australian politics

Labor’s journey from Whitlam’s humiliation to Albanese’s record majority reveals the most dramatic reversal in our political history.

The day that shocked the nation

An hour-by-hour, minute-by-minute, account of John Kerr’s dramatic dismissal of Gough Whitlam and installation of Malcolm Fraser as prime minister 50 years ago.

Whitlam’s long shadow still looms over us all

His ‘crash through or crash’ leadership not only reformed Labor, it embedded left-wing ideals and a centralising regulatory culture that reshaped Australian governance.

Whitlam ignored all the warnings

Newly discovered documents show the public service repeatedly told Gough Whitlam that he faced possible dismissal by John Kerr but he undertook no contingency planning.

I saw it all – Kerr’s move strengthened democracy

The action of the governor-general resolved an administrative gridlock and political stalemate.

My dad’s downfall brought out the worst and best in people

‘Friends’ made themselves scarce, enemies emerged, and even Clarence the dog copped it. Gough Whitlam’s son Nick reveals the personal toll behind a very public chapter in Australia’s history.

Truth and fury: Whitlam Dismissal not quite as unprecedented as it seemed

Labor’s rage over Gough Whitlam’s sacking created assumptions that Kerr’s actions were unprecedented and unconstitutional. But the historical record tells a different story: the key elements had happened before.

‘Don’t write some emotional piece of trash’: Paul Kelly on the Dismissal

At just 28, journalist Paul Kelly covered the dismissal of the Whitlam government for The Australian with the straight-news impartiality and rigorous analysis that would become his trademarks. Gough got sacked - and so did Kelly, but he came back stronger than ever | WATCH NOW

Kerr failed by not warning Whitlam: Fraser

In never-before-revealed papers, Malcolm Fraser came to the view that John Kerr was wrong to dismiss Gough Whitlam without warning and should have consulted him ‘more freely’ during 1975.

Kerr’s torture over Whitlam dismissal revealed from grave

Former governor-general Sir John Kerr poured out his heart in notes about his dismissal of Gough Whitlam, revealing him to be obsessed, troubled and utterly delusional.

Dismissal day: ‘People very nearly fell down in the street with dismay’

It was a day of ‘stupefaction and dismay’ for Australian artists and writers - and they rallied to Whitlam in the wake of his sacking on November 11, 1975.

The Dismissal wasn’t the end of democracy

In fact, Australia escaped virtually unscathed from the political crisis of 1975.

An unforgettable Remembrance Day

The Whitlam era was one of enduring change and great mistakes.

‘Partisan ambush’: PM fights for Whitlam in scorching speech

Anthony Albanese has launched an extraordinary attack on the 1975 dismissal of Labor hero Gough Whitlam, declaring it a calculated conservative plot rather than constitutional crisis.

From the moment it was revealed, the Dismissal divided families, workplaces, classrooms, communities and newspapers, including this one. In his commentaries Kelly was a powerful critic of Kerr, arguing the governor-general had abused the reserve power, the power of the crown, by not consulting properly with his prime minister. Kelly also knew, amid economic chaos of which he had been highly critical, that Whitlam, a brilliant but deeply flawed politician, was on a hiding to nothing at the election, which Labor lost in a landslide. The Australian , overall, was also highly critical of Whitlam’s government, believing it was an economic danger to the country – which it was, as was evident in the Khemlani loans scandal. But unlike Kelly, the paper backed Liberal Party leader Malcolm Fraser, a stoic, intimidating character who as opposition leader precipitated the crisis by blocking supply in the Senate. We also supported the Dismissal, arguing: “No country can prosper, develop or sustain and expand a generous social program for the people unless it can afford it.”

New insights are still emerging, 50 years later. In an astonishing archival discovery, Bramston revealed this week, Fraser came to agree with Whitlam on a central point of the drama: that Kerr should have warned Whitlam and not dismissed him by surprise ambush. The governor-general failed in his duty to discuss the options facing the nation with the prime minister of the day. Kerr doubtless feared Whitlam would have sacked him had he warned about the possibility of using his reserve powers.

Those powers still exist but, as Kelly writes, the system should never be pushed to such a breaking point again. Nor will it. All subsequent governors-general have said, in public or private, they would not have acted as Kerr did. And the nation’s recovery from those events, and subsequent history, show the resilience of Australia’s democracy.