1974 Australian referendum (Mode of Altering the Constitution)

Since federation, voters in the Australian territories had been excluded from voting in referendums. Constitution Alteration (Mode of Altering the Constitution) 1974 was an Australian referendum held in the 1974 referendums which sought to alter the Australian Constitution to enabling electors in the Northern Territory and the Australian Capital Territory to vote in referendums and for their votes to be counted in the national majority, but not towards any state total.

Question

Proposed law entitled "An Act to facilitate alterations to the Constitution and to allow electors in territories, as well as electors in the states, to vote at referendums on proposed laws to alter the Constitution".

Do you approve the proposed law?

Results
Result
StateOn

rolls

 Ballots

issued

 For Against Invalid
% %
New South Wales2,834,558 2,702,903 1,367,47651.35% 1,295,621 48.65%39,806
Victoria2,161,474 2,070,893 1,001,75349.22% 1,033,486 50.78%35,654
Queensland1,154,762 1,098,401 480,92644.29% 604,816 55.71%12,659
South Australia750,308 722,434 311,95444.26% 392,891 55.74%17,589
Western Australia612,016 577,989 240,13442.53% 324,435 57.47%13,420
Tasmania246,596237,891 95,26440.72% 138,674 59.28%3,953
Australian Total7,759,714 7,410,511 3,497,50747.99% 3,789,923 52.01%123,081
Obtained majority in one State and an overall minority of 292,416 votes.
Not carried

Discussion

This referendum attempted to alter the way in which the results of referendum questions would be tallied. The votes of residents of territories was to be included in the national totals for deciding national majority and a majority of voters in only three of the six states would need to vote 'yes', rather than four out of six as in previous referendums.

Prior to this referendum, there were three referendum questions in which a majority of voters nationwide and the majority of voters in fewer than four states voted 'yes', which resulted in rejection of these questions. Had this modification been in place, two out of three of these questions would have carried. Additionally, in the two instances following this referendum where a majority of voters nationwide and the majority of voters in fewer than four states voted 'yes', only one of these outcomes would have been changed had this modification been in place.

A similar question without the modification to the double majority rule was put to referendum in Australian referendum, 1977 (Referendums), and was carried strongly. Given this, and examining the results of this question it can be inferred that the states with small populations were unwilling to give up their power for the sake of giving votes to territorians.

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