Charles Cameron Kingston

Charles Cameron Kingston
photograph
neg.5520
National Library of Australia

THE NATIONAL LIBRARY OF AUSTRALIA'S
FEDERATION GATEWAY


KINGSTON, CHARLES CAMERON (1850-1908)

As South Australia’s Premier, Kingston brought the vote to women in his State and was a radical federationist, solicitous of the public welfare, if erratic in his personal life.

Politician and son of Sir George Strickland, Kingston was born in Adelaide on 22 October 1850. He was admitted to the South Australian Bar in 1873 and in 1881 elected to the House of Assembly.

Kingston was Attorney-General in the first Playford Ministry from June 1887 to June 1889, and played an important part in the introduction of legislation for the protective tariff and payment of members of parliament. He was Premier of South Australia from 1893-99, and his far-reaching legislation included women's franchise, generous factory laws, industrial conciliation, and the establishment of a State bank; he drafted most of his own legislation.

He took part in the Premiers' Conference which drafted the Federal Constitution, and in 1901 became Minister for Trade and Customs in the first Federal Government. Kingston resigned over dissent caused by his Arbitration Bill, which would have extended Federal control over the States' railways.

He died in Adelaide on 11 May 1908. Sir Edmund Barton said of him, 'His labours were not concluded by the setting of the sun…but the hour of exhaustion.'

Books of interest

The National Library of Australia has a newspaper clippings file for Charles Kingston as well as some manuscript material (MS 281; MS 962).

 

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