Donald MacLennan Grant (26 February 1888 – 11 June 1970) was a leader of the Industrial Workers of the World in Sydney, a member of the

Sydney Twelve The Sydney Twelve were members of the Industrial Workers of the World arrested on 23 September 1916 in Sydney, Australia, and charged with treason under the ''Crimes Act 1900'' (NSW) Treason-Felony. which incorporated the Treason Felony Act 1848, ...

charged with conspiracy in 1916, and later a member of the Australian Labor Party who was elected to Sydney City Council, appointed to the

New South Wales Legislative Council The New South Wales Legislative Council, often referred to as the upper house, is one of the two chambers of the parliament of the Australian state of New South Wales. The other is the Legislative Assembly. Both sit at Parliament House in th ...

, and elected to the

Australian Senate The Senate is the upper house of the Bicameralism, bicameral Parliament of Australia, the lower house being the House of Representatives (Australia), House of Representatives. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Chapter ...

in 1943 where he served for sixteen years.

Biography

Born in

Inverness Inverness (; from the gd, Inbhir Nis , meaning "Mouth of the River Ness"; sco, Innerness) is a city in the Scottish Highlands. It is the administrative centre for The Highland Council and is regarded as the capital of the Highlands. Histori ...

, Scotland in 1888, Grant emigrated to Australia prior to the First World War. He joined the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) and became known as one of their best public speakers, regularly drawing large crowds at The Domain, Sydney speaking against

conscription Conscription (also called the draft in the United States) is the state-mandated enlistment of people in a national service, mainly a military service. Conscription dates back to antiquity and it continues in some countries to the present day un ...

, and for militant direct action against the war and capitalism. Tom Barker, the editor of the IWW newspaper ''Direct Action'', was arrested, convicted and sentenced to six months prison for publishing the famous anti-war poster, which said:

To ARMS! Capitalists, Parsons, Politicians, Landlords, Newspaper Editors, and other Stay-at-home Patriots. Your Country needs you in the trenches! Workers, Follow your masters!

Grant is reported to have told the crowd at the Sydney Domain that ''for every day that Barker is in gaol, it will cost the capitalists 10,000 pounds''. These fifteen words formed the large part of the case against him in 1916 when he was arrested and charged as part of the Sydney Twelve with arson, conspiracy to prevent justice and incitement to sedition. He received a sentence of fifteen years, which inspired

Henry Boote Henry Ernest Boote (1865 – 1949) was an Australian editor, journalist, propagandist, poet, and fiction writer. Wrote ‘A Fool’s Talk’ (1915) Biography Born in Liverpool, England, 20 May 1865, Boote began working as an apprentice to a pri ...

, editor of ''The Worker'' to write ''The case of Grant, Fifteen years for Fifteen Words''. Agitation for a review of the case and the release of all twelve prisoners started immediately and included a Royal Commission which found that Grant had been wrongly convicted. He was subsequently released in August 1920. Disillusioned with the IWW hostility to parliamentary politics, Grant was the Industrial Socialist Labor Party candidate for the New South Wales Legislative Assembly seat of Sturt in the 1922 state election. He gained less than 8% of the primary vote. Grant joined the Australian Labor Party in 1923. He soon won Labor preselection and was elected to the Sydney City Council for thirteen years. He was appointed by the Annual Conference of the NSW Labor Party to the Socialisation Committee from 1930 to 1933. In 1931 he was appointed to the New South Wales Legislative Council, where he represented the ALP for eight years. Turning to Federal politics, Grant was elected in 1943 as a Labor party Senator for New South Wales, and was an influential member of the Labor Party parliamentary caucus. At the height of the

1949 Australian coal strike The 1949 Australian coal strike was the first time that Australian military forces were used during peacetime to break a trade union strike. The strike by 23,000 coal miners lasted for seven weeks, from 27 June 1949 to 15 August 1949, with troops ...

Grant told the miners:

I come to Cessnock for one reason. In 1917...everyone was behind the workers
n the general strike N, or n, is the fourteenth letter in the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''en'' (pronounced ), plural ''ens''. History ...
but they got beaten. Why? Because the State was against them. I have come here to tell you you won't beat the State.

He had particular interest in international affairs. This resulted in his selection as an Australian representative to the 1946

Paris Peace Conference Agreements and declarations resulting from meetings in Paris include: Listed by name Paris Accords may refer to: * Paris Accords, the agreements reached at the end of the London and Paris Conferences in 1954 concerning the post-war status of Germ ...

, a delegate to the International Labor conference in Montreal, and the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association conference in Nairobi, Kenya in 1954. At the age of 71 in 1959 he failed to gain endorsement from the Labor party and retired from politics to his Sydney home where he died on 11 June 1970.

References

* ''Donald Grant – a Tribute'' by W McNamara in ''Labour History'' No 19, November 1970 * ''Sydney's Burning (An Australian Political Conspiracy)'', Ian Turner (1969) {{DEFAULTSORT:Grant, Donald Australian Labor Party members of the Parliament of Australia Australian trade unionists Industrial Workers of the World leaders Scottish politicians British emigrants to Australia Politicians from Inverness Politicians from Sydney 1888 births 1970 deaths Industrial Workers of the World members Members of the Australian Senate Members of the Australian Senate for New South Wales 20th-century Australian politicians Members of the New South Wales Legislative Council Industrial Workers of the World in Australia