Talk:John Hope, 7th Earl of Hopetoun

Untitled

"The Australians resented an Englishman being in charge of official business." This is a bit POV, besides the obvious fact that he wasn't an Englishman, but a Scot.

Shouldn't this be moved to John Adrian Louis Hope, 7th Earl of Hopetoun, or does "Earl of Hopetoun" almost always refer to this person, like with the Duke of Wellington. If so, John Adrian Louis Hope should at least redirect here. --Jiang 23:22, 24 Oct 2003 (UTC)

In his lifetime hardly anybody would have known what his actual name was, almost everybody knew him and referred to him as Lord Hopetoun. This was usually the case with peerages. And no, there was no other Earl of Hopetoun of any note.

We do have a problem with peers, I think. In Britain they are always referred to by their titles and not by their names. In a paper encyclopaedia Hopetoun would be listed under "Hopetoun, John Adrian Louis Hope, 7th Earl of", and there would be no problem. No-one would think to look for the Duke of Wellington under Wellesley. In this format I suppose a redirect from his name to his title might be a good idea.

I am in the process of writing articles on all the Governors-General of Australia, but as you see at that page I didn't decide what to call the articles. I would have used their titles rather than their names.

Adam 03:14, 25 Oct 2003 (UTC)

Decided to be bold and add the story of Hopetoun's friendship with well known Melbourne anarchist and trade unionist, Chummy Fleming. There is probably too much detail, and when an entry for Fleming gets created, some of it can move there. I just thought it was an amusing story not to include in its entirety, including the quote from the Age report. Source for this is the Biography of Chummy Fleming by Bob James.--Takver 07:34, 3 May 2005 (UTC)

This is too long a digression in an article of this length. I suggest you write an article on Fleming and move most of it there. Adam 08:04, 3 May 2005 (UTC)

Is it worth mentioning that Hopetoun, Western Australia was named in his honour?

Yes. Also Hopetoun, Victoria. Adam 07:53, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Governor-General-designate

I assume that his term as G-G did not officially commence until 1 January 1901. Prior to that, there was no "Commonwealth of Australia" of which he could have been the G-G. Instead, I assume he must have been "Governor-General-designate", albeit with the power to commission a government to take office on 1 January (a power that would never normally be available to G-Gs-designate). Is this the case, and should we make this distinction in the article? -- JackofOz 01:31, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Hi Jack - I see you're back on this. Hopetoun was appointed to be G-G on 14 July 1900 - I've put that in, and described him on arrival as "incoming". I agree that he didn't actually became G-G until he took the oath of office. He could have made many arrangements for a Commonwealth government before that, then signed the commissions etc as soon as he had been sworn in. --Wikiain (talk) 02:36, 3 September 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. I'm a bit anal sometimes about technical details like this. Since nobody in the dying days of 1900 said to him "Mate, you're not the governor-general yet, so you have no power to commission anyone to do anything", it's not really our place to question the understanding between the palace, Hopetoun and the Australian colonial officials (as they still were). Arrangements had to be made, regardless of the finer points of protocol. Maybe he technically remained the GG-designate prior to 1 January 1901, but he was still carrying out the Queen's wishes in the meantime, and it serves no real purpose to belabour the point. -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 02:48, 3 September 2011 (UTC)

The difference between the anal and the legalistic may be a fine one. But everybody knew generally what needed to be done and, as you will know, most of the important things, such as holding an election and summoning a parliament, were already provided for in the Constitution which came into operation on 1 January 1901. The "blunder" came about partly because the office of prime minister is not in the Constitution but would exist, as in Britain, only by convention. --Wikiain (talk) 03:07, 3 September 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure I agree with that, Wikiain. Even if the office of PM had been defined or even just mentioned in the Constitution, Hopetoun would still have had to choose someone as an interim PM between January and March, but all he had to work with were candidates none of whom could claim to be the leader of the majority parliamentary party, because there was no parliament and hence no parliamentary parties to be leader of. He had no incumbent Prime Minister to advise him. So he went to the next best thing, the Premier of the senior colony. A quite reasonable move in the circumstances, imo. That Lyne didn't work out was not the huge "blunder" it's been portrayed, again imo. It was more Lyne's blunder for not advising Hopetoun that he (Lyne) was unlikely to be able to attract the necessary support and he (Hopetoun) should instead approach a more likely candidate such as Barton. Maybe Lyne had an eye to history and wanted to become our inaugural PM, and thought he could somehow scrape up the necessary support. But it was not to be. It was soon fixed, and we had our first government all ready to go by New Year's Day. -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 03:30, 3 September 2011 (UTC)

By "partly", Jack, I meant only that Hopetoun was without express constitutional guidance on whom to appoint. If the constitution had included among its interim provisions a rule about who should be appointed as the first PM, Hopetoun would have had to appoint whoever fulfilled the rule's criteria. I can't find any discussion of this in the Convention Debates (online at Parlinfo Search). The framers seem to have left the question open - deliberately, since it can hardly have failed to cross their minds. However, to have included a rule like the one that Hopetoun would adopt would have threatened public support for federation in the other colonies. I'll have a look at La Nauze and other sources. --Wikiain (talk) 23:49, 3 September 2011 (UTC)

Australia has never had constitutionally codified rules about these things, but there are unwritten rules and protocols. I take your point that 1900 was a unique circumstance where the usual rules could not apply - but what formula could the founding fathers have come up with? Did they want to be seen to be dictating to the viceroy how to make his decision? I don't think so. Such a formula would inevitably have had to include terms such as "the person most likely to gain support" - yet how is such a thing to be gauged? Everyone wanted a stable government, which is exactly why he did not go ahead and appoint Lyne. The person most likely to achieve stable government was Barton, and so he got the nod. I'm sure the founding fathers trusted in the good sense of all concerned to come up with a workable solution before Federation Day, and that's what we got, with only a minor glitch. That glitch was magnified because Hopetoun turned out to be a bit of a failure and was not well-liked. But if he'd been considered a great success and been greatly loved, the so-called "Hopetoun Blunder" would be relegated to a minor matter hardly worth talking about, not the capitalised Significant Event in our early history it's become. -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 00:42, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

Connected with this discussion, do you and others think that the article Hopetoun Blunder, which imo is looking a bit forlorn, should be merged into this one? --Wikiain (talk) 23:55, 3 September 2011 (UTC)

Despite my views above, I think it deserves its own article. It could be beefed up with more detail of what went on behind the scenes, what lengths Lyne might have gone to to secure support, etc. -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 00:42, 4 September 2011 (UTC)

Disembarkation at Perth

This story looks odd. At that time there was no rail connection between Western Australia and the eastern states: Rail transport in Western Australia. Even after a line was built, and until the advent of airlines, the normal way to travel from Perth or Fremantle to the east was by ship. In that case, a stopover in Perth instead of Melbourne would surely not have been a big deal. --Wikiain (talk) 01:11, 3 September 2011 (UTC)

Bogus story

"Though he was initially intended to arrive via Melbourne, local politicians insisted that the incoming Governor-General should disembark in Perth before going on to Sydney. Illness and misadventure following the Indian leg of the journey disrupted Hopetoun's tour and made the arduous arrival preparations difficult to complete. Lady Hopetoun had suffered a relapse of her condition during the trip across Australia, adding further to Hopetoun's personal troubles."

This story looks quite bogus. He may well have gotten off the ship at Perth, to avoid some conflict over whether he should arrive at Sydney or at Melbourne first. But then, he would have gotten right back on the ship ( or a different ship ) to continue his journey to Melbourne. He certainly did not ""make a trip across Australia"". The railway was not finished until 1918.Lathamibird (talk) 06:15, 26 April 2018 (UTC)