page_title: 1919 Australian federal election
section_title: Background
hierarchical_section_title: 1919 Australian federal election / Background
caption_attribution_description: English: Australian soldiers carry 'the little digger' (Australian Prime Minister Billy Hughes) along George Street, Sydney in triumph after the Prime Minister returned from the Paris Peace Conference in 1919.
context_page_description: The 1919 Australian federal election was held on 13 December 1919 to elect members to the Parliament of Australia. All 75 seats in the House of Representatives and 19 of the 36 seats in the Senate were up for election. The incumbent Nationalist Party government won re-election, with Prime Minister Billy Hughes continuing in office.
  The 1919 election was the first held since the passage of the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918, which introduced preferential voting for both houses of parliament – instant-runoff voting for the House of Representatives and preferential block voting for the Senate. It was held several months earlier than constitutionally required, so that the government could capitalise on the popularity of Hughes after his return from the Paris Peace Conference. The Nationalists campaigned on the government's war record and appealed to return soldiers. The Australian Labor Party, in opposition since the 1916 party split, contested a second election under the leadership of Frank Tudor. However, T. J. Ryan was the party's national campaign director and played a key role in the campaign.
context_section_description: The Nationalist Party, formed after the 1916 Labor Party split, won a large majority at the 1917 federal election. In April 1918, Prime Minister Billy Hughes left Australia to attend the Imperial War Cabinet. He was overseas for sixteen months, which saw the signing of the Armistice of 11 November 1918 and the Paris Peace Conference. He was at the height of his popularity during this time, and was widely feted when he returned to Australia in August 1919.  According to Robert Garran, who was both Solicitor-General of Australia and Hughes' personal secretary at the conference, there were three main problems that confronted him upon his return – profiteering, high prices, and industrial unrest.
  At the ALP Federal Conference in early October 1919, a resolution was passed calling on T. J. Ryan, premier of Queensland, to enter federal politics. He agreed to do so, and was appointed to the new position of "national campaign director". Con Wallace, MP for West Sydney, agreed to give up the ALP nomination to allow Ryan to win a safe seat. Opposition Leader Frank Tudor remained the party's formal leader, but Ryan had a higher public profile and led the ALP's campaign. According to King O'Malley, who met with him in Hobart a few weeks before the election, Ryan believed that he would become prime minister if Labor won the election.
caption: Hughes being carried through George Street, Sydney, upon his return from the Paris Peace Conference in 1919; he was at the height of his popularity during that time
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