Dorothy Tangney and Enid Lyons entering the front door of the House of Representatives at Old Parliament House in 1943; courtesy of the Australian War Memorial.
Dame Dorothy Tangney and Dame Enid Lyons became Australia’s first women federal parliamentarians in 1943. They advocated throughout their terms for a variety of women’s rights issues and opened the door for future women parliamentarians.
Women’s suffrage was achieved in Australia after decades of determined campaigning by thousands of women. The Commonwealth Franchise Act 1902 granted most Australian women the right to vote and to stand in federal elections.1
It would take 41 years for the Franchise Act to be fully realised, when in 1943 Dame Dorothy Tangney was elected to the Senate, and Dame Enid Lyons was elected to the House of Representatives. Both women spoke of being aware of the cultural responsibility as ‘parliamentary firsts’. Their appointments and their successes within them, helped change cultural negative perceptions about women’s capabilities as leaders.
Dame Dorothy Tangney
Dorothy Tangney at her desk at Old Parliament House; courtesy of the Museum of Australian Democracy.
Dame Dorothy Tangney (1907—1985) was Australia’s first woman senator and the first Labor woman in federal Parliament. A champion of women’s rights, she was a tireless advocate for education, and health and welfare services for all Australians.
Tangney’s social and political activism drew her to politics. She campaigned unsuccessfully for election to the Western Australia State Parliament in 1936 and 1939, and to the Senate in 1940. Her opportunity finally came 21 August 1943 when Labor’s landslide electoral victory in 1943 saw her elected to fill a casual Senate vacancy following Edward Johnston’s death and the defeat of his initial replacement, Charles Latham. Tangney championed equal pay and opportunities, and financial support for disadvantaged women and war widows. From 1943 to 1946 she was a member of the Joint Committee on Social Security and advocated for increased old-age pensions, Indigenous welfare, a national health system and subsidised education. In 1948 Tangney was the first Australian woman to attend an Empire Parliamentary Association conference. She was re-elected to the Senate in 1946, 1951, 1955 and 1961, serving as a senator for nearly 25 years and for 14 years was the only woman represented in the Labor caucus.
Mr Speaker. It would be strange indeed were I not tonight deeply conscious of the fact, and not a little awed by the knowledge, that on my shoulders rests a great weight of responsibility. Because this is the first occasion upon which a woman has addressed this house. For that reason, it is an occasion which, for every woman in the Commonwealth, marks in some degree a turning point in history.
I also realise my great honour in being the first woman to be elected to the Senate. But it is not as a woman that I have been elected to this chamber. It is as a citizen of the Commonwealth, and I take my place here with the full privileges and rights of all honourable Senators, and what is still more important, with the full responsibilities that such a high office entails.
Maiden speech by Dame Dorothy Tangney,
24 September 19432
Dame Enid Lyons
Dame Enid Lyons presides over the Federal Executive Council, 1950; courtesy of the National Archives of Australia.
Enid Lyons (1897 — 1981) was the first woman elected to the House of Representatives and the first appointed to federal Cabinet. As the wife of Prime Minister Joe Lyons, she had been ‘a partner in the most prominent marriage in Australian politics’ and one of the few in which both spouses served in the federal Parliament.3
A staunch advocate for women’s political participation, Lyons unsuccessfully contested the 1925 state election for Labor. Re-entering politics after her husband’s death, Lyons stood as the United Australia Party candidate for the House of Representatives seat of Darwin (Tasmania) in 1943. While Labor won government, she narrowly won the seat. She was re-elected with increased majorities in 1946 and 1949. During her time, she was an advocate for issues including social security, housing, extension of child endowment and free medical treatment for pensioners. A skilled orator, she participated in debate on state and national issues including atomic energy, finance, population, industry, arbitration, and immigration. In December 1949, she become the first woman member of a federal Cabinet when she was appointed Vice-President of the Executive Council in the Menzies Government. Lyons resigned from parliament in 1951 and continued a long career in public service.
I am well aware that, as I acquit myself in the work that I have undertaken for the next three years, so shall I either prejudice or enhance the prospects of those women who may wish to follow me in public service in the years to come.
Dame Enid Lyons, House of Representatives,
29 September 19434
Although from different parties and chambers, both women faced unique obstacles in parliament because of their gender. Old Parliament House for example did not have designated toilets for women. (Although they were permitted to use the junior staff and visitors’ toilets, there would not be a ‘Ladies Toilets’ until 1974)5. Throughout both their careers the media would often pigeonhole them as the ‘mothers’ of Parliament6. Lyons spoke to the pressure of gender roles when she lamented on her appointment as Vice-President of the Executive Council that, ‘they only wanted me to pour the tea’.7
Tangney’s and Lyons’ legacy has seen women go on to hold the highest offices in Australia, from the Hon Dame Quentin Bryce as Governor General in 2008 and Julia Gillard as Prime Minister in 2010 .
In recognition of them being significant ‘firsts’ in parliament, their portraits were commissioned for the Historic Memorials Collection. See the portraits here.
References
1. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women and men were not federally granted the option to enrol and vote until 1962.
2. D Tangney, ‘Governor-General’s Speech: Speech in Reply’, Senate, Debates, 24 September 1943, p. 30.
3. Portrait of politician and women’s rights activist, Enid Lyons’, National Archives of Australia.
4. E Lyons, ‘Governor-General’s Speech: address in reply’, House of Representatives, Debates, 29 September 1943, p. 182.
5. M Taflaga, ‘Who knew that toilets would have such a complicated history?’, Museum of Australian Democracy, 24 March 2014.
6. As cited in E van Acker, ‘Media representations of women politicians in Australia and New Zealand: High expectations, hostility or stardom’, Journal of Politics and Society, Taylor and Francis Group. 7. D Langmore, ‘Lyons, Dame Enid Muriel (1897–1981)’, Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, published first in hardcopy 2012; ‘Joseph Lyons’ partner: Enid Lyons’, National Archives of Australia.