tag:theconversation.com,2011:/global/topics/b-a-santamaria-19458/articlesB.A. Santamaria – The Conversation2020-06-12T01:25:02Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1387192020-06-12T01:25:02Z2020-06-12T01:25:02ZBob Santamaria, ‘the most significant’ figure in Australian politics never to have been in parliament<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/340825/original/file-20200610-34710-1c6wd4e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C660%2C483&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>The Conversation is running a <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/key-figures-in-australian-political-history-86822">series of pieces</a> on key figures in Australian political history, examining how they changed the country and political debate. You can read our articles on Julia Gillard and Henry Parkes <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-julia-gillard-forever-changed-australian-politics-especially-for-women-138528">here</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/henry-parkes-had-a-vision-of-a-new-australian-nation-in-1901-it-became-a-reality-131453">here</a>.</em></p>
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<p>Bartholomew Augustine (“Bob”) Santamaria is the most significant figure in Australian politics never to have held political office. </p>
<p>Santamaria was a friend of, or associated with, four Australian prime ministers: Robert Menzies, Malcolm Fraser, John Howard and Tony Abbott. But his career was spent outside parliament. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/book-review-santamaria-a-most-unusual-man-45732">Book review: Santamaria, A Most Unusual Man</a>
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<p>There are two crucial things that need to be understood about Santamaria in order to make sense of his work. One is he was a devout lay Catholic whose career began in church-sponsored organisations. The other is he was both anti-socialist and anti-capitalist. </p>
<p>His ideal society was one composed of small property owners. In the 1940s and 1950s, he dreamed of an Australia dotted with rural villages.</p>
<h2>Italian and Irish Catholic influences</h2>
<p>Santamaria was born in Melbourne in 1915, the son of Italian migrants. His father ran a greengrocery in Brunswick. </p>
<p>While his background was Italian, his intellectual formation was in the largely Irish Catholic education system. He was bright, studying arts and law at Melbourne University. </p>
<p>After graduating, he did not practise law, but worked instead for the church as a layman for the Australasian National Secretariat of Catholic Action.</p>
<p>Catholic involvement in Australian political culture in the early part of the 20th century had been somewhat marginal; for example, the Federation conventions contained few Catholic participants. But the 1930s saw a flourishing of Catholic intellectual and cultural life in Australia, such as the Campion Society, of which Santamaria was a member. </p>
<h2>Moving Catholics towards the centre, fighting communists</h2>
<p>What Santamaria achieved was to move Catholics much closer to the centre of Australian politics. He did this both through the force of his intellect and his political actions. </p>
<p>He was an ideas man. From the early 1940s to the mid-1950s, Santamaria drafted most of the social justice statements authorised by the Archbishops and Bishops of the Catholic Church of Australia, many of which had circulations of more than 100,000. </p>
<p>For a long time, he had no public profile. But his major contribution came leading the fight to extinguish communist control of, and influence in, trade unions. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/340828/original/file-20200610-34710-3yalo8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/340828/original/file-20200610-34710-3yalo8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340828/original/file-20200610-34710-3yalo8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340828/original/file-20200610-34710-3yalo8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340828/original/file-20200610-34710-3yalo8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340828/original/file-20200610-34710-3yalo8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340828/original/file-20200610-34710-3yalo8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Santamaria moved Catholics closer to the centre of Australian politics.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Danny Casey/AAP</span></span>
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<p>Although communism never had much appeal to the Australian voter, it had considerable influence in a number of unions, especially in the 1940s. </p>
<p>Santamaria mimicked communist techniques, setting up a shadowy organisation that used sometimes dubious tactics to gain union control. Called the Catholic Social Studies Movement, it was simply known as “the Movement” and operated largely in secrecy. </p>
<p>If the communists fought dirty, then Santamaria, as the leader of the Movement, understood the need to engage in tactics like rigging union elections. The ends justified the means.</p>
<h2>Labor, the DLP and Santamaria’s undoing</h2>
<p>The great prize in all of this, of course, was the Australian Labor Party, with its strong trade union links. </p>
<p>Communism was in decline in Australia by the early 1950s, but the anti-communist movement went from strength to strength. By 1953, there was a federal election in the offing, which Labor seemed guaranteed to win because of the state of the economy. Santamaria’s papers indicate that at this point, he contemplated the possible takeover of the ALP.</p>
<p>It all went terribly wrong. Economic conditions improved and the Menzies-led Coalition won the 1954 election. In the fallout, the ALP’s bitter leader, H.V. “Doc” Evatt, instigated moves that led to a <a href="https://www.nma.gov.au/defining-moments/resources/alp-split">split in the Labor Party</a>, the exit of many Catholics from the ALP and the creation of the Democratic Labor Party (DLP). </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/australian-politics-explainer-the-labor-party-split-74149">Australian politics explainer: the Labor Party split</a>
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<p>Santamaria, who had previously been a somewhat shadowy figure, suddenly emerged into the limelight. This occurred because Evatt denounced the Movement and its role in the Labor Party. It was a personal disaster for Santamaria, because it pushed him out of his political roles with regard to both the Church and the unions.</p>
<p>He desperately wanted to influence public policy in Australia, but the DLP was only a rump party that largely appealed to Catholics. He was now outside the ALP tent and he certainly was not going to be admitted to that of their Liberal opponents.</p>
<h2>Reinvention in print and on TV</h2>
<p>Essentially, Santamaria then reinvented himself as a commentator on public affairs. That was how he was known until his death in 1998. </p>
<p>His organisation, the National Civic Council, published News Weekly, and later the AD2000 magazine, to propagate his ideas. </p>
<p>He also had a TV program, “Point of View” on Channel 9 that began in 1963 and went for <a href="https://halloffame.melbournepressclub.com/article/b--a---bob--santamaria">nearly 30 years</a>. Later in life, he had a regular column in The Australian. He no longer played the same active political role that he had earlier in life, but his ideas reached a large audience through the media.</p>
<p>In this later period, Santamaria gravitated towards people who were, or had been, Liberals. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-traditionalists-are-restless-so-why-dont-they-have-a-party-of-their-own-in-australia-63405">The traditionalists are restless, so why don't they have a party of their own in Australia?</a>
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<p>He became great friends with Menzies following Menzies’s retirement. In 1992, there was an abortive attempt, involving Santamaria, academics Robert Manne and John Carroll to <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/time-to-put-to-rest-claims-of-abbotts-dlp-tendencies-20120521-1z17i.html">form a new political party</a> that included Fraser. Howard <a href="https://mupublishing.tumblr.com/post/125826754803/read-the-first-chapter-of-santamaria/amp">visited Santamaria</a> on his death bed. </p>
<p>Abbott had connections with Santamaria going back to his <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/early-elections-20120903-2593o.html">student days</a>.</p>
<h2>A ‘tragic failure’</h2>
<p>Whether Santamaria exercised any influence over these figures is questionable. It does seem that they found him congenial, and he certainly possessed considerable charisma.</p>
<p>In some ways, Santamaria can be seen as a tragic failure. He was an intelligent and passionate man, who desired to create a better world, but whose actions led to conflict and dissension. </p>
<p>He was, perhaps, the victim of his own hubris. That said, it is difficult to find another individual who had such an impact on Australian life for so long. His autobiography, Against the Tide, still repays reading.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/138719/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gregory Melleuish receives funding from the Australian Research Council. He is a member of the academic advisory board of the Menzies Research Centre</span></em></p>Bob Santamaria knew four Australian prime ministers. Is he the most significant figure in Australian politics never to have held office?Gregory Melleuish, Professor, School of Humanities and Social Inquiry, University of WollongongLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/741492017-04-18T01:48:11Z2017-04-18T01:48:11ZAustralian politics explainer: the Labor Party split<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/161685/original/image-20170320-9144-15llph4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C10%2C665%2C410&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">B.A. Santamaria (left) played a significant role in the Labor split and the formation of the Democratic Labor Party.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Matthew_Beovich_and_B_A_Santamaria_1943.jpg">Wikimedia Commons</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>The Conversation is running a <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/australian-politics-explainer-37192">series of explainers</a> on key moments in Australian political history, looking at what happened, its impact then, and its relevance to politics today.</em></p>
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<p>The Labor split started in earnest in October 1954, when federal leader H.V. Evatt denounced the <a href="http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/evatt-herbert-vere-bert-10131">“disloyal” activities</a> of a militant anti-communist faction operating predominantly in the party’s Victorian branch. Tumult followed.</p>
<p>In March 1955, rival Victorian Labor delegations competed for admission to the party’s federal conference in Hobart, further crystallising the split. A month later, the Victorian Labor government was sacrificed as anti-communist breakaways <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victorian_state_election,_1955">crossed the floor</a> to support an opposition-initiated no-confidence motion.</p>
<p>In the federal sphere, Liberal Prime Minister Robert Menzies <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_federal_election,_1955">called an early poll</a> to capitalise on Labor’s chaos. The result was an emphatic victory for the Coalition, which benefited from preferences from the Australia Labor Party (Anti-Communist), later renamed the Democratic Labor Party (DLP). </p>
<p>Influenced by distinctive local factors, the split also engulfed Queensland Labor in 1957. Premier Vince Gair was expelled from the party. This precipitated an election that delivered power to the Coalition in Queensland.</p>
<p>But the seeds of this political calamity predated Evatt’s combustible statement. For complex socioeconomic and other reasons, a majority of Irish Catholics had historically voted for Labor, and the schism during the first world war over conscription further strengthened this ethno-sectarian alignment. In turn, there had always been a tension between socialist impulses within the labour movement and Catholicism. </p>
<p>The risk of conflict escalated in the 1930s, as the small but resolute local Communist Party made inroads into the labour movement. </p>
<p>By the 1940s, communists controlled key trade unions. This prompted Labor state branch organisations to establish “industrial groups” to combat that influence. These groups proved effective, but became closely entwined – especially in Victoria – with the Catholic Social Studies Movement.</p>
<p>“The Movement” had been set up by the bishops and was directed by <a href="https://theconversation.com/book-review-santamaria-a-most-unusual-man-45732">B. A. Santamaria</a> to exploit the position of Catholics within the labour movement to fight atheistic communism. </p>
<p>Santamaria’s ambition for The Movement expanded from it stiffening anti-communist resolve in the trade unions to it becoming a trojan horse for transforming the Labor’s personnel and policies. Those dreams were fanciful, but Santamaria’s zealotry and Evatt’s intemperance were crucial to the split. </p>
<p>Trade union powerbrokers who were determined to subjugate Labor’s parliamentary wing – even at the price of political oblivion – were also responsible.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/161687/original/image-20170320-9147-1xx75im.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/161687/original/image-20170320-9147-1xx75im.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=463&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/161687/original/image-20170320-9147-1xx75im.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=463&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/161687/original/image-20170320-9147-1xx75im.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=463&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/161687/original/image-20170320-9147-1xx75im.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=582&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/161687/original/image-20170320-9147-1xx75im.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=582&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/161687/original/image-20170320-9147-1xx75im.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=582&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Labor leader Doc Evatt (right) meets British Prime Minister Clement Attlee in 1954.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cleament_Attlee_and_Doc_Evatt.jpg">W. Brindle</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
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<h2>What was its impact?</h2>
<p>The split destroyed Labor governments in Victoria and Queensland. The party was relegated to opposition for a generation. It did not regain office in these states until 1982 and 1989 respectively. </p>
<p>Better sense prevailed within the ALP’s top counsels and Catholic hierarchy elsewhere, enabling Labor governments to ride out the storm in New South Wales, Tasmania and Western Australia. </p>
<p>Federally, however, the consequences were also devastating for the ALP. Becoming prime minister for the second time in 1949, Menzies’ hold on office was initially far from secure; the elections of 1951 and 1954 were close run. But the Labor split gifted him political dominance. </p>
<p>In contrast, despite remaining at the ALP’s helm until 1960, the brilliant but mercurial Evatt never recovered politically or psychologically. </p>
<p>Another legacy was the DLP, which at its zenith held the balance of power in the Senate and buttressed non-Labor governments, federal and state, through watertight preference flows. </p>
<p>The split dramatically realigned Catholic voting. Tribal Labor supporters were torn between their religious and political faiths. The upward social mobility of Catholics in post-war Australia was destined to diversify their voting behaviour, but in one stroke a sizeable chunk hived off to the DLP.</p>
<p>It has also been suggested that, over time, the DLP acted as a bridge for Catholics to transfer loyalty to the Liberal Party: a side of politics where they had been traditionally unwelcome. </p>
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<span class="caption">The anti-communist Victorian state Labor executive was locked out of the party’s federal conference in Hobart.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://petrov.moadoph.gov.au/the-split.html">National Library of Australia</a></span>
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<h2>What are its contemporary implications?</h2>
<p>The effects of the split washed out of the political system during the 1970s. </p>
<p>Federal intervention in the Victorian Labor Party in 1970 to correct its post-split deformities was an important prerequisite for the party winning office federally in 1972, and a decade later in Victoria. </p>
<p>The first of these victories undermined the DLP’s fundamental rationale – to deny Labor power nationally. In 1974, it lost its representation in the Senate. A few years later it expired.</p>
<p>Viewed from today’s post-Cold War and secularised society, the conflicts at heart of the split appear curiously arcane. Yet the ghosts of those events linger. </p>
<p>In 1985, four trade unions – including the powerful and conservative Shop Distributive and Allied Employees’ Association – that had affiliated with the DLP in the 1950s were controversially readmitted to the ALP. Their presence continues to influence Labor’s contemporary factional power balance.</p>
<p>The DLP – or its bastard child – resurrected in the 2000s and has since had members elected to the Senate and the Victorian Legislative Council. </p>
<p>We are also reminded of how much the presence in the modern Liberal Party of a high-profile conservative Catholic grouping recast religious political allegiances following the split. Among them is former prime minister Tony Abbott – an <a href="http://www.canberratimes.com.au/national/public-service/tony-abbotts-career-echoes-that-of-his-political-hero-b-a-santamaria-20150630-gi1y12.html">unashamed Santamaria protégé</a>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/74149/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Paul Strangio does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Viewed from today’s post-Cold War and secularised society, the conflicts at heart of the Labor split appear curiously arcane. Yet its ghosts remain.Paul Strangio, Associate Professor of Politics, Monash UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/634052016-08-03T04:21:52Z2016-08-03T04:21:52ZThe traditionalists are restless, so why don’t they have a party of their own in Australia?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/132882/original/image-20160803-17183-cmpe3j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Liberal senator Cory Bernardi claims his 'Australian Conservatives' movement has recorded more than 50,000 registrations.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP/Sam Mooy</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>In 1985, B.A. Santamaria <a href="http://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/1538743">speculated about the possibility</a> of a new political party in Australia that would be composed of the Nationals, the traditionalist section of the Liberal Party and the “moderate and anti-extremist section of the blue-collar working class”.</p>
<p>Today this combination of groups would probably be referred to as “conservatives”, but the Santamaria term “traditionalist” seems more appropriate. Despite the changes that have occurred over the past 30 years, the traditionalist section of the population is still there, even if technological change and the decline of manufacturing industry has had a massive impact on the blue-collar working class.</p>
<p>Two things are interesting. One is this hypothetical party has not come into being. The second is the 2016 election results indicate these three components of such a party still exist, even if they have not coalesced.</p>
<p>The election saw a <a href="https://theconversation.com/defiant-hanson-will-test-a-coalition-government-61985">resurgence of One Nation</a>, a <a href="http://vtr.aec.gov.au/HouseStateFirstPrefsByParty-20499-NSW.htm">significant increase</a> in the vote of the Christian Democratic Party in New South Wales, a very good showing for the Nationals, and a massive repudiation of Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull by western Sydney.</p>
<p>Liberal senator Cory Bernardi now claims his “Australian Conservatives” movement <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/cory-bernardis-australian-conservatives-group-signs-up-50000-people-online-20160801-gqin07.html">has recorded</a> more than 50,000 registrations since its founding after the election.</p>
<p>The elements of Santamaria’s “traditionalists” remain fragmented, but could be potentially powerful should they come together. The central question is: why have they failed to come together in a new party?</p>
<h2>Why has it never happened?</h2>
<p>One answer is John Howard. Howard, who <a href="http://www.harpercollins.com.au/9780730499640/">admires Santamaria</a>, understood the need to reconcile this section of the Australian population who would be tempted to vote for such a party. If John Hewson had been elected in 1993 the story might have been much different.</p>
<p>Faced by the threat of One Nation after 1996, Howard sought as prime minister both to neutralise One Nation’s impact and appeal to those who supported Pauline Hanson. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.adelaide.edu.au/apsa/docs_papers/Aust%20Pol/Brent.pdf">“Howard’s battlers”</a> were succeeded by <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3078988/Tony-s-Tradies-Prime-Minister-s-small-business-owners-ll-able-claim-20-000-tax-expenses-new-utes-photocopiers-coffee-machines.html">“Tony’s tradies”</a>. It is worth remembering that Tony Abbott was one of <a href="http://www.news.com.au/national/one-nation-co-founder-suing-tony-abbott-for-15m/story-fncynjr2-1226622032265">Hanson’s fiercest foes</a>.</p>
<p>In the last 12 months, under the leadership of an eastern suburbs small-l liberal, the Liberal Party has decided it wants to look more like the party of Hewson than the party of Howard. In so doing, it has seriously risked alienating its “traditionalist” support.</p>
<p>Another answer to the failure of a “traditionalist” party to emerge lies in the fractious nature of right-wing politics in Australia. This form of politics <a href="http://trove.nla.gov.au/work/16368192?selectedversion=NBD2541336">has its roots</a> in the 19th-century ideal of the independent member who votes according to conscience and dislikes being told what to do. This makes collective action quite difficult. They find it hard to accept party discipline.</p>
<p>One Nation <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-07-10/timeline-rise-of-pauline-hanson-one-nation/7583230">disintegrated as a single entity</a> when it had 11 members elected to the Queensland parliament in 1998. Something similar <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-clive-palmers-personal-party-is-doomed-to-end-in-tears-38772">occurred to the Palmer United Party</a> in the federal parliament after 2013.</p>
<p>Politicians who value their independence tend to have strong personalities, which makes it difficult for them to work with other strong personalities. It is difficult to see how this problem could be resolved.</p>
<p>This lack of unity is a real problem for “traditionalists”. It will not be resolved unless they can find a mechanism that allows them to work together.</p>
<p>However, what the 2016 election result does indicate is that when the Liberal Party becomes too liberal it will alienate a significant part of its electoral base. It did so in 1993 and it has done so again in 2016. </p>
<p>If the Liberals cannot reconcile their conservative elements, then they will fail to win those seats in rural and regional Australia, especially in NSW and Queensland, they need if they wish to form government. </p>
<p>The Liberals will also surrender seats in the Senate to “traditionalists” who have the capacity to make their lives a misery. If, however, they alienate some of their liberal vote, all this will mean will be a reduced majority in safe liberal seats.</p>
<h2>Could it ever become a reality?</h2>
<p>What, then, are the prospects of Santamaria’s “traditionalist” party becoming a reality? Two conditions need to be fulfilled for it to happen. </p>
<p>One is that the Liberal Party adopts ultra-liberal policies in both economic matters and social and cultural policy. The other is that a figure emerges among the traditionalists who possesses sufficient charisma to enable them to unite. None of the current “traditionalist” leaders appears to have the capacity to unite the various groups.</p>
<p>Neither of these conditions seems likely to be fulfilled in the short term. Instead, the Liberals will continue to limp along, caught between a rock and a hard place. </p>
<p>If they become too liberal, they will risk alienating “traditionalist” voters who they need if they are to retain power. If they become too “traditionalist”, they will be denounced in sections of the media. </p>
<p>The Coalition won the 2016 election by the barest of margins. If there is a message in that near-death experience it is that the Coalition cannot continue to be the government of the day if it claims the ultra-liberal mantle of <a href="http://australianpolitics.com/1993/01/15/liberal-party-video-fightback.html">Hewson and Fightback!</a>. This is the danger of having a leader who comes from the seat of Wentworth.</p>
<p>There is a significant number of “traditionalists” out there in the electorate, and the Liberal Party cannot take their support for granted.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/63405/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gregory Melleuish receives funding from the Australian Research Council. He is a member of the Academic Advisory Board of the Menzies Research Centre.</span></em></p>In the last 12 months, under the leadership of an eastern suburbs small-l liberal, the Liberal Party has decided it wants to look more like the party of Hewson than the party of Howard.Gregory Melleuish, Associate Professor, School of History and Politics, University of WollongongLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/457322015-08-17T20:27:13Z2015-08-17T20:27:13ZBook review: Santamaria, A Most Unusual Man<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/90980/original/image-20150806-25032-10pg56l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C14%2C665%2C456&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">B.A. Santamaria (left) is the subject of a new biography by political commentator Gerard Henderson.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Bob Santamaria deserves Gerard Henderson’s lively and informative biography, <a href="https://www.mup.com.au/items/159548">Santamaria: A Most Unusual Man</a>, because he was an inherently interesting man and because of the large place he and the organisations he led occupy in Australian political history.</p>
<p>Santamaria also naturally sparks continued speculation about his role in shaping Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s career and values, fuelled by Abbott’s own <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/content/2015/s4284995.htm">references to him</a> as his first political mentor.</p>
<p>Henderson clearly has the credentials to write it because of his previous research, going back more than 30 years to Santamaria and the Bishops. So, this biography has had a long gestation. It is also born out of an <a href="http://www.theaustralian.com.au/opinion/columnists/my-friendship-with-the-charismatic-unusual-bob-santamaria/story-fnkqo7i5-1227465257129">association</a> between the biographer and his subject. </p>
<p>The book is therefore the culmination of both traditional research and an accumulation of relevant documents and insights through the observations of a participant in National Civic Council (NCC) meetings in the 1970s. </p>
<p>It contains a thorough bibliography and index but is not footnoted. At times, because of its gestation period, I don’t think sufficient account is taken of some other recent accounts, including Kevin Peoples’ <a href="http://www.garrattpublishing.com.au/product/9781921946165/">Santamaria’s Salesman</a>. </p>
<p>Henderson knows his subject and is right to correct errors by authors such as David Marr and myself, but he also makes it too obvious when he has disdain for others working in this territory, such as Marr, Jim Griffin and Brenda Niall, the author of the <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/books/mannix-review-brenda-nialls-biography-is-a-shrewd-and-elegant-account-20150403-1mdf1o.html">recent biography</a> of Archbishop Daniel Mannix. He uses the combative style that readers of his <a href="http://www.theaustralian.com.au/opinion/columnists/gerard-henderson">newspaper columns</a> will recognise.</p>
<p>Henderson has produced a rounded and at times fascinating portrait of Santamaria and of some of his closest colleagues. He covers his whole life, from his family and schooling through his lifetime’s devotion to the cause of Catholic Action, broadly defined, in leadership positions in the Australasian National Secretariat of Catholic Action, the Catholic Social Studies Movement and the NCC. </p>
<p>Henderson’s broad conclusion is that Santamaria was a compelling, skilled and persuasive man who was enormously devoted to his causes. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/91728/original/image-20150813-21387-1sbeq7c.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/91728/original/image-20150813-21387-1sbeq7c.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/91728/original/image-20150813-21387-1sbeq7c.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=912&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/91728/original/image-20150813-21387-1sbeq7c.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=912&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/91728/original/image-20150813-21387-1sbeq7c.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=912&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/91728/original/image-20150813-21387-1sbeq7c.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1146&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/91728/original/image-20150813-21387-1sbeq7c.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1146&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/91728/original/image-20150813-21387-1sbeq7c.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1146&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Melbourne University Publishing</span></span>
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<p>Henderson is generous to his subject but certainly not uncritical of Santamaria’s strategy and tactics on occasions. He made this clear to Santamaria himself many years ago in an episode at a NCC seminar also <a href="http://www.theaustralian.com.au/opinion/columnists/hendersons-santamaria-book-highlights-nccs-crucial-role/story-e6frg76f-1227462278942">covered recently</a> by Greg Sheridan in <a href="https://www.allenandunwin.com/browse/books/general-books/biography-autobiography/When-We-Were-Young-and-Foolish-Greg-Sheridan-9781760113391">When We Were Young and Foolish</a>. He believes that Santamaria was right about his one big thing – anti-communism – but wrong about some other things, though he was most influential on the question of state aid to private schools. </p>
<p>Revealingly, Henderson concludes that Santamaria “led a relatively isolated life” with respect to international and even national travel, but also in regard to personal contacts with those he could have sought to influence, such as some bishops and politicians:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>There was home, there was the Church, there was the Carlton Football Club, there was the office and, more broadly, there was The Movement.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Henderson also paints a portrait of a man who could be difficult to work with and who could sometimes be extremely hard and unfair on those within his organisations who disagreed with him or sought to supplant him. This conclusion is reached in a chapter entitled “The Cult of (Santamaria) Personality”.</p>
<p>Henderson’s treatment of Santamaria’s early working life and of his role in the Labor <a href="http://www.nma.gov.au/online_features/defining_moments/featured/alp_split">divisions</a> of the 1950s which produced the Democratic Labor Party is authoritative and detailed, though interpretations will continue to differ.</p>
<p>For those who feel they know this story well enough, it is the later chapters – which deal with Santamaria and the Liberal Party, including John Howard and Abbott, and the NCC’s internal politics – which may be of particular interest. Santamaria was far from close to the Liberals and at times quite hostile to them. He appears not to have encouraged conservative young Catholics, including Abbott and Kevin Andrews, to become active in that party. </p>
<p>According to Henderson, Abbott was:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>… influenced by – but not a follower of – BAS. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>If that is the case, then commentators have been misled by Abbott’s own inflated comments about the relationship.</p>
<p>Another instructive chapter is devoted to Santamaria the outstanding polemicist and media performer, especially through his long-running television show Point of View. It was here that Santamaria was especially compelling, speaking a seven-minute memorised script to camera with only a rare stumble. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/XLoZalF29JY?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Santamaria on Point of View, 1985.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In this way, a wider audience had some insight into Santamaria’s dominating performances within his own organisations and before episcopal audiences. These seem often, according to Henderson, to have been self-indulgently long but doubtless still persuasive to many true believers, many of whom devoted their lives to following his leadership.</p>
<p>Ultimately, however, this biography is a labour of love, or at least a labour to ensure that a man that Henderson greatly admires receives due credit for his achievements.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/45732/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>John Warhurst does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Gerard Henderson has produced a rounded and at times fascinating portrait of B. A. Santamaria. His broad conclusion is that Santamaria was a compelling, skilled and persuasive man who was enormously devoted to his causes.John Warhurst, Emeritus Professor of Political Science, Australian National UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.