page_title: William Forgan Smith
section_title: Premiership
hierarchical_section_title: William Forgan Smith / Premiership
caption_attribution_description: Construction of Forgan Smith Building at the University of Queensland, Australia, 1940.
context_page_description: William Forgan Smith was an Australian politician. He served as Premier of the state of Queensland from 1932 to 1942. He came to dominate politics in the state during the 1930s, and his populism, firm leadership, defence of states' rights and interest in state development make him something of an archetypal Queensland Premier. He represented the Labor Party.
context_section_description: Once in power, Forgan Smith was confronted most immediately with the problem of how to respond to the Great Depression: in particular, the need to reduce unemployment. Notwithstanding his earlier rebukes of A.E. Moore's administration, he followed (as Moore had done) the principles of the Premiers' Plan, while simultaneously insisting that the federal government meet its contractual obligations. Determined to bring jobless figures in Queensland down, he moved to implement something akin to the New Deal of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, although his term of office predated Roosevelt's presidency by some nine months. Like Roosevelt, he owed much to the economic theory of John Maynard Keynes.
  Forgan Smith was willing to raise taxes, especially on the wealthy and on corporations, in order to fund unemployment relief programs. He was successful in raising revenue from £5.6 million in 1932–33 to £8.6 million in 1938–39; in the process he turned Queensland into Australia's highest taxing state. The Commonwealth Bank also paid Queensland £920,000 as part of a program to aid the states. This money was put towards coupons and relief work.
  Along with most other Queensland premiers, before and since, Forgan Smith was an advocate of development. As such, he could put the relief work programs to good use building infrastructure and undertaking other capital works projects. He embarked on a number of ambitious schemes, including the Story Bridge, an upgrade of Mackay Harbour, the Somerset Dam (which was not completed until after the end of his premiership) and a new building for the University of Queensland at St. Lucia that now bears his name. The relief work program was unsound over the long term, and was meant as a stop-gap measure. In some cases, local authorities took advantage of it, while in other cases, communities became dependent on it. For example, at one stage half of the workers of Coolangatta on the Gold Coast were on relief work. In 1938 relief work was abolished in favour of a permanent, long-term capital works program.
  Under Forgan Smith's rule, the weekly payments received by relief workers were raised to the level of the basic wage (a measure financed by a graduated income tax), while a major public works programme was initiated which boosted job opportunities and provided the state which major constructions of lasting worth. When minister of agriculture in 1926, Forgan Smith had established a faculty of agriculture at the University of Queensland. Now that he was premier, he established new faculties at the same university in Dentistry, Veterinary Science, and Medicine. As noted by Ross McMullin, the establishment of these new faculties 'was part of the co-ordinated development of the university and Queensland's health services.' In 1938, Smith claimed that Queensland enjoyed ‘the highest wage system, the best conditions of labour and the lowest unemployment’ in the country.'
   Sometimes Forgan Smith incurred criticism for being authoritarian and dictatorial, although he was neither the first nor the last premier of his state to inspire such accusations.  He used his strong and forceful personality to dominate the cabinet and parliament, and his government passed a number of controversial pieces of legislation. He added clauses to the 1936 Racing Bill which made it harder for reporters to find out and divulge information about proposed legislation, which drew heavy criticism from the press. The 1940 Public Safety Bill gave the state government unprecedented powers during wartime. The most authoritarian of his government's measures, though, was probably the Transport Act of 1938, which allowed the Government to declare ‘State of Emergency’ in any part or all of the state for any time for any reason. In such a case, the government's actions were effectively beyond legal challenge. Admittedly, these laws were more or less in line with similar ones passed in other jurisdictions (for example, the Official Secrets Act in the United Kingdom). Also, Forgan Smith never declared a state of emergency himself – it would fall t
caption: Construction of the Forgan Smith Building at The University of Queensland, 1940.
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