Hugh Mahon

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Hugh Mahon (6 January 1857 – 28 August 1931) was an Irish-born Australian politician and a member of the first Commonwealth Parliament for the Australian Labor Party.

Mahon was born at Killurin, near Tullamore, King's County, Ireland and migrated with his family to the United States in 1867, where he learnt about printing. He returned to Ireland in about 1880 and was jailed in 1881 for political agitation along with Irish National Land League leaders including Charles Stewart Parnell, but was released due to ill-health. He migrated to Australia in 1882 to avoid re-arrest and worked for newspapers in Goulburn and Sydney, before acquiring a newspaper in Gosford. He married Mary Alice L'Estrange in 1888 and subsequently sold his newspaper to follow her back to her birthplace, Melbourne. In 1895, he moved to Coolgardie, Western Australia.^[1]

[edit] Political career

Mahon stood unsuccessfully for the state seat of North Coolgardie in 1897, but won the new federal seat of Coolgardie at the 1901 election for Labour. He was Postmaster-General in the Watson government in 1904 and Minister for Home Affairs in the Fisher government of 1908-09. In 1913, the seat of Coolgardie was abolished and partly replaced by Dampier, for which he stood unsuccessfully. Following the death of the incumbent, Charles Frazer, he won Kalgoorlie unopposed at a by-election on 22 December 1913.^[2] He became Minister for External Affairs in December 1914 until the Labor split in 1916.^[1]

Mahon lost his seat in 1917, but won it back in 1919. After the death of the Irish nationalist Terence McSwiney in a hunger strike in October 1920, Mahon attacked British policy in Ireland and the British Empire, referring to it as "this bloody and accursed despotism", at an open-air meeting in Melbourne on 7 November. Prime Minister Billy Hughes moved to expel him^[1] and on 12 November, the House of Representatives passed a resolution that he had made "seditious and disloyal utterances at a public meeting" and was "guilty of conduct unfitting him to remain a member of this House and inconsistent with the oath of allegiance which he has taken as a member of this House." As such, Mahon became the first and only MP to be expelled from the Federal Parliament. (Under Section 8 of the Parliamentary Privileges Act, 1987 [1] neither house any longer has the power to expel a member from membership of the house.) He failed to win back his seat at the subsequent by-election on 18 December, although he did manage to obtain 48.64% of the vote in a two-candidate race.^[3]

After a trip to Europe and Ireland, Mahon died in 1931 at the Melbourne suburb of Ringwood, and was survived by his wife and four children.^[1]

[edit] References

Political offices
Preceded by Philip Fysh	Postmaster-General 1904	Succeeded by Sydney Smith
Preceded by John Keating	Minister for Home Affairs 1908–1909	Succeeded by George Fuller
Preceded by John Arthur	Minister for External Affairs 1914–1916	Title abolished
Parliament of Australia
New division	Member for Division of Coolgardie 1901–1913	Division abolished
Preceded by Charles Frazer	Member for Division of Kalgoorlie 1913–1917	Succeeded by Edward Heitmann
Preceded by Edward Heitmann	Member for Division of Kalgoorlie 1919–1920	Succeeded by George Foley

Persondata
NAME	Mahon, Hugh
ALTERNATIVE NAMES
SHORT DESCRIPTION	Politician
DATE OF BIRTH	6 January 1857
PLACE OF BIRTH	Killurin, near Tullamore, King's County, Ireland
DATE OF DEATH	28 August 1931
PLACE OF DEATH	Ringwood, near Melbourne, Australia