James (Jim) Ford Cairns was born in Drummond Street, Carlton (Melbourne) to James John and Letitia Cairns. His father, originally from Glasgow, enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force (AIF) the following year and subsequently served in France and the United Kingdom. He apparently did not return to Australia and Jim Cairns spent his early childhood in his maternal grandparents' home at Milton, Victoria. He attended the local state school, later Sunbury State School and Northcote High School.

Following a period of unemployment during the Depression, Cairns' first job was as a clerk. He then joined the Victorian Police Force (1935-44) and, in 1939, married Gwendolyn Olga Robb. The marriage lasted 60 years.

In the early 1940's Cairns studied Commerce part time at the University of Melbourne. As a policeman, he was in a reserved occupation and was refused permission to enlist with the 2nd AIF. In January 1945, after appealing to his former Chief (General Sir Thomas Blamey), he was released from the Police Force and served in the Australian Army Education Service in Australia and New Guinea. Discharged in January 1946, Cairns returned to his university studies and became a senior tutor in economic history at the University of Melbourne. He was subsequently a lecturer and then senior lecturer (1951-55). With a Masters degree in Commerce and a Nuffield Fellowship, Cairns spent a year at Oxford University under G D H Cole (1950). In 1957, he was awarded the degree of Doctor of Philosophy from the University of Melbourne for his thesis on 'The Welfare State in Australia'. 

In 1955, following a split in the Australian Labour Party (ALP) and the formation of the Democratic Labour Party, Cairns stood as the endorsed ALP candidate for the Victorian federal seat of Yarra. He won the seat by 600 votes from the sitting member, S M Keon, one of the original breakaway members. Cairns retained the seat until an electoral redistribution in July 1968. He subsequently held the seat of Lalor until retiring from federal Parliament prior to the 1977 general election. 

The early period of Cairns' political career was unremarkable, although he was a member of the Joint Committee of Public Accounts and Audit (1959-60). During the Vietnam War, however, Cairns became prominent in the anti-war movement and was outspoken on conscription. He organised and led the first Moratorium March (8 May 1970) and attended anti-war Conferences in Budapest and Oslo (1971).

When the Whitlam Labor Government came to office in December 1972, Cairns was appointed to the portfolios of Secondary industry (1972-73) and Overseas Trade (1972-74). He was later Deputy Prime Minister and Treasurer (1974-75), during which period he also acted as Prime Minister on several occasions during the absences overseas of E G (Gough) Whitlam. Always a controversial figure, Cairns was dismissed from these positions in July 1975, after misleading Parliament over loans negotiations and amid publicity of an affair with his private secretary, Junie Morosi. He then became Minister for the Environment, and served on Parliamentary Standing Committees on Privileges and Standing Orders, until the dismissal of the Whitlam Government in November 1975.

Dr Cairns died in Melbourne in October 2003.

Publications:

Dr Cairns' list of publications includes

Australia (Lands and Peoples Series, 1953)
Living with Asia (Melbourne, Lansdowne Press, 1965)
The Eagle and the Lotus: western intervention in Vietnam 1847-1971 (Melbourne, Lansdowne Press, 1969)
Silence Kills: events leading up to the Vietnam Moratorium of 8 May (Richmond, Vic, Vietnam Moratorium Committee, 1970)
The Quiet Revolution (Melbourne, Gold Star Publications, 1972)
Oil on Troubled Waters (Camberwell, Vic, Widescope International, 1976)
Vietnam: scorched earth reborn (Camberwell, Vic, Widescope International, 1976)
Human Growth: its source and potential (Canberra, Research for Survival, 1984)
Strength Within: towards an end to violence (Narre Warren, Vic, Nakari Publications, 1988)
The Untried Road ((Narre Warren, Vic, Nakari Publications, 1990)
Towards a New Society (Narre Warren East, Vic, J Cairns, 1994)
Reshaping the Future (Narre Warren East, Vic, J Cairns, 1997)
On the Horizon: a cultural transformation to a new consciousness (Narre Warren East, Vic, J Cairns, 1999)


Sources:

Canberra Times, 13 October 2003, pp 1-2
Parliamentary Handbook, 19th ed (1975), pp 54-55; 19th ed supplement (1976), p 42; 20th ed (1978), p 218
Who's Who in Australia 2003, p 375

Agency associated with person unregistered

       1935-       1944: Victorian Police Force Officer
23 Jan 1945-24 Jan 1946: Australian Army Education Service
       1946-       1955: Member of academic staff, Economic History,
                         Melbourne University
       1964-       1969: Australian Labor Party, Victorian
                         Executive - Member