page_title: Joseph Cahill
section_title: Early political career
hierarchical_section_title: Joseph Cahill / Early political career
caption_attribution_description: NSW Politicians Mr. Tom Shannon and J. J. Cahill talking at a desk, New South Wales, c. 1930s.
context_page_description: John Joseph Cahill, also known as Joe Cahill or J. J. Cahill, was a long-serving New South Wales politician, railway worker, trade unionist and Labor Party Premier of New South Wales from 1952 to his death in 1959. Born the son of Irish migrants in Redfern, New South Wales, Cahill worked for the New South Wales Government Railways from the age of 16 before joining the Australian Labor Party. Being a prominent unionist organiser, including being dismissed for his role in the 1917 general strike, Cahill was eventually elected to the Parliament of New South Wales for St George in 1925.
  After many years of backbench service, including a term outside of parliament, Cahill was eventually appointed Secretary for Public Works in 1941 and Minister for Local Government in the government of William McKell in 1944, where he led significant reforms of local government in the state, including establishing a Royal commission in 1945, and passing the landmark Local Government Act of 1948. Promoted to Deputy Premier in 1949, Cahill became Premier of New South Wales from April 1952 to his death in October 1959.
context_section_description: Eight years after his first tilt at state politics, Cahill was elected as one of the members of the NSW Legislative Assembly seat of St George at the 1925 state election, which brought the Labor party back into government under Jack Lang. He was never counted among the close allies of Lang, and remained on the backbench throughout Lang's two terms in government. Cahill, along with half of the parliamentary caucus, supported Peter Loughlin, when the latter challenged Lang for the party leadership in September 1926. With the abolition of the St George constituency in 1930, Cahill ran for Arncliffe and was appointed party whip. However, Cahill lost his bid to be re-elected for Arncliffe to United Australia Party's Horace Harper, at the 1932 election, with the electoral tide sweeping out the dismissed Lang Labor government.
  This defeat, nevertheless, proved to be only a temporary setback, and Cahill found work as a shop inspector for a shoe retailer in the interim. Retaining his interest in political matters, Cahill (despite his earlier support of Loughlin) stayed loyal to Lang when many in the ALP had deserted the flamboyant ex-Premier. He exclaimed to an Arncliffe Labor meeting: "Mr. Lang is the greatest friend the workers have ever had, and time will prove that Lang is right." In 1935, Cahill was returned to parliament in Arncliffe for the State Labor Party despite the overall defeat at the election, declaring that while "the Press had poisoned the minds of the people, [...] ten years after he was dead the Press would proclaim Mr. Lang as the greatest hero Australia had seen for many a long day."
  With Lang's leadership in doubt after a further election loss in 1938, Cahill abandoned his former praise of Lang, and he backed a caucus motion to support federal intervention in the state branch's factional infighting which had led to several of his colleagues defecting to the Industrial Labor Party, led by Bob Heffron,the member representing Botany in Sydney's south-east. Cahill subsequently supported William McKell, when he successfully challenged Lang for the Labor Party leadership in September 1939, and was elected to the party executive.
  A frequent speaker in the assembly, Cahill often addressed his fellow parliamentarians on railway-related matters and lobbied the government (unsuccessfully) for an extension of the Cooks River Tram Line to Arncliffe. The Labor party swept back into office at the 1941 election and McKell became the new Premier. He appointed Cahill as Secretary of Public Works. When Arncliffe was abolished in 1941, Cahill switched to the new electorate of Cook's River.
caption: Cahill as Party Whip, with NSW Labor Treasurer, Tom Shannon.
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