Arthur Calwell was born in West Melbourne. He attended St Mary's School until 1909, when he won a scholarship to the Christian Brothers College in North Melbourne. Calwell started work in 1913 as a clerk in the Department of Agriculture in the Victorian Government. He transferred to the state Treasury in August 1925, where he stayed until he was elected to federal Parliament in 1940.

 Parliamentary Career:

Calwell joined the Australian Labor Party (ALP) in 1916, thus running the risk of dismissal from his clerical position as public servants were not permitted to join political parties at that time. In 1926 he was elected to the Victorian Central Executive of the ALP, and in 1930 became President of the Party’s Victorian Branch. Calwell was elected to federal Parliament in September 1940 as ALP member for Melbourne, although the Menzies Government (Liberal) was returned to office. In the Curtin, Forde and Chifley Labor Governments, Curtin was Minister for Information (1943-49). In the Chifley Government, as the first Minister for Immigration (1945-49), Calwell pioneered the post-war immigration programme. In 1946 18,000 migrants were brought into Australia, and by 1949 the annual intake had risen to 150,000.

During his political career, Calwell also served as a member or Chairman on several Committees, relating to Broadcasting (1941-43), Medical Co-ordination (1942-44), Aliens Classification (1942-46), Censorship (1943-45), Standing Orders (1954-60) and Constitutional Review (1956-59).

In June 1951, Arthur Calwell became Deputy Leader of the Opposition. Elected Leader of the ALP in 1960, he also became Leader of the Opposition until succeeded by E G (Gough) Whitlam in February 1967. This period coincided with a major split within the ALP and the formation of the Democratic Labor Party (DLP). In 1966, Calwell was wounded in an assassination attempt in Sydney, the first to be made on an Australian politician. By the time he retired from Parliament in November 1972, he was the Father of the House of Representatives having served as a Member of Parliament for 32 years. Arthur Calwell died on 8 July 1973.

 Non-Parliamentary Career:

Calwell was President of the North Melbourne Football Club (1928-34), and became the first life member of the club. He was a Trustee of the Melbourne Cricket Ground from 1931 (Chairman from 1953), the last Alderman to be elected to the Melbourne City Council (1939-45), a Commissioner for the Melbourne and Metropolitan Board of Works (1939-45), a member of the Executive Committee of the Organising Committee for the 1956 Olympics in Melbourne and National Vice-President of the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust from 1965.

In 1963, he received a papal knighthood for services to the Catholic Church, a Knight Commander of the Order of St Gregory the Great (with Silver Star). Calwell was Roman Catholic, although his disputes with members of the Church hierarchy were well publicised. He was made a Privy Councillor in 1967 and awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws by Melbourne University in 1970.

 Publications:

How Many Australians Tomorrow? (Melbourne, Reed and Harris, 1945)

Immigration Policy and Progress (Canberra, Dept of Immigration, 1949)

Labor's Role in Modern Society (Melbourne, Lansdowne Press, 1963)

Be Just and Fear Not (Hawthorn, Vic., L O’Neil in association with Rigby, 1972)

Sources:

Parliamentary Handbook, 10thed (1945), 15thed (1965)

Who’s Who in Australia 1955 and 1975 

Wikipediahttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Calwell accessed 16 July 2013

Australian Dictionary of Biography: accessed 16 July 2013