The Parliament shall … have power to make laws for the peace, order, and good government of the Commonwealth ...

Constitution, Section 51

The Australian Parliament which met for the first time in May 1901 was the most democratic in the world. The members of the first Parliament were a remarkable group of individuals, fired with a sense of destiny. In three years of hard work they laid the legislative foundation of the nation.

This exhibition tells the story of our first federal Parliament: its origins, who its members were, how it worked, and its achievements.

ORIGINS	ELECTION	OPENING	MEMBERS	WORK
The Origins of the Australian Parliament	Electing the First Commonwealth Parliament	The Inauguration of the Australian Parliament	The First One Hundred and Eleven	A Nation-building Parliament

The public exhibition For Peace, Order, and Good Government, on which this online exhibition is based, was erected by the Department of the Senate at Parliament House, Canberra, in March 2001, as a Department of the Senate Centenary of Federation Project. It was dismantled in March 2008.

View photographs of the original exhibition