Edward Findley (8 September 1864 – 26 October 1947) was an Australian politician and publisher. He served as a Senator for

Victoria Victoria most commonly refers to: * Victoria (Australia), a state of the Commonwealth of Australia * Victoria, British Columbia, provincial capital of British Columbia, Canada * Victoria (mythology), Roman goddess of Victory * Victoria, Seychelle ...

from 1904 to 1917 and from 1923 to 1929, representing the

Australian Labor Party The Australian Labor Party (ALP), also simply known as Labor, is the major centre-left political party in Australia, one of two major parties in Australian politics, along with the centre-right Liberal Party of Australia. The party forms t ...

(ALP). He was also a member of the

Victorian Legislative Assembly The Victorian Legislative Assembly is the lower house of the bicameral Parliament of Victoria in Australia; the upper house being the Victorian Legislative Council. Both houses sit at Parliament House in Spring Street, Melbourne. The presidin ...

from 1900 to 1901.

Early life

Findley was born in

Bendigo, Victoria Bendigo ( ) is a city in Victoria (Australia), Victoria, Australia, located in the Bendigo Valley near the geographical centre of the state and approximately north-west of Melbourne, the state capital. As of 2019, Bendigo had an urban populat ...

(then called Sandhurst), and was apprenticed as a compositor on ''The Bendigo Independent'' before moving to

Melbourne Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a met ...

in the early 1880s to work on the ''Daily Telegraph'', which closed in 1892. He became an active unionist and was elected president of the Australasian Typographical Union in 1897. He established a weekly newspaper, ''The Boomerang'' in 1894, but it ran for only eight issues. In 1896, he helped establish the '' Toscin'', a radical union weekly, which continued in publication until 1906.

Political career

Findley was elected as an

member for the

seat of

in 1900, but was expelled from parliament on 25 June 1901 for

seditious libel Sedition and seditious libel were criminal offences under English common law, and are still criminal offences in Canada. Sedition is overt conduct, such as speech and organization, that is deemed by the legal authority to tend toward insurrection ...

because, as editor of the ''Toscin'', he was held responsible for republishing an article from the

Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of the Wicklow Mountains range. At the 2016 c ...

''Irish People'' which was critical of

King Edward VII Edward VII (Albert Edward; 9 November 1841 – 6 May 1910) was King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and Emperor of India, from 22 January 1901 until his death in 1910. The second child and eldest son of Queen Victoria a ...

. Findley stood at the ensuing by-election but was not successful, after the number of Liberal candidates opposing him was reduced to avoid vote splitting. He also stood unsuccessfully for the seat in 1902. Findley won a seat in the Australian Senate at the 1903 election. He was an honorary minister in the second Fisher Ministry from 1911 to 1913, and was responsible in the Senate for matters handled by the

Minister of Home Affairs An interior minister (sometimes called a minister of internal affairs or minister of home affairs) is a cabinet official position that is responsible for internal affairs, such as public security, civil registration and identification, emergency ...

and the

Postmaster-General A Postmaster General, in Anglosphere countries, is the chief executive officer of the postal service of that country, a ministerial office responsible for overseeing all other postmasters. The practice of having a government official responsible ...

. In 1911, he married Lilian Foyle. He was defeated at the 1917 election, but returned to the Senate at the 1922 election. He was defeated again at the 1928 election. From 1930 until his death, Findley was a government director of the Commonwealth Oil Refineries Ltd., a government-owned oil retailer, established by the Hughes ministry in 1920 and sold to British Petroleum in 1952. He died in his home in the Melbourne suburb of Caulfield, survived by his wife and one of his two daughters.

Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Findley, Edward Australian Labor Party members of the Parliament of Australia Victoria (Australia) state politicians Members of the Australian Senate for Victoria Members of the Australian Senate Members of the Cabinet of Australia People expelled from public office 1864 births 1942 deaths 20th-century Australian politicians Australian newspaper founders Australian newspaper publishers (people) People from Bendigo 20th-century Australian businesspeople