Crawford Vaughan

Vaughan was born in Adelaide, the son of government photolithographer Alfred Vaughan.{{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article129258375 |title=Nearly 80 Years of Age |newspaper=The News |volume=XII |issue=1,770 |location=South Australia |date=18 March 1929 |access-date=11 April 2019 |page=2 |via=Trove}} mentions various prominent family members He was educated at the Norwood and Marryatville public schools and then Prince Alfred College. After leaving school, he worked for Elder, Smith & Co. Ltd for four years.{{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article74652518 |title=Mr. Crawford Vaughan |newspaper=The Advertiser |location=Adelaide |date=16 December 1947 |access-date=26 January 2016 |page=3 |via=Trove}}

Vaughan was elected to the House of Assembly at the 1905 state election, winning a seat for the United Labor Party in the five-member Torrens at the age of 30. He had previously made two unsuccessful attempts for office: as a Free Trade Party candidate for the Australian House of Representatives at the 1901 federal election, and as an independent candidate for the Australian Senate at the 1903 federal election. He became party whip in 1909, and was promoted to Cabinet as Treasurer when John Verran led Labor to victory at the 1910 election. He was elected leader of the Labor Party when Verran resigned in 1913 following the Labor defeat 1912 election.

Vaughan and Labor defeated the Liberal Union government led by Archibald Peake at the 1915 election, with 26 of 46 seats in the House of Assembly. At the time, he was the youngest Premier in Australia at the age of 40. His brother, John Vaughan, became his Attorney-General. His government improved the education system by restructuring the department's senior bureaucracy, by extending the years of compulsory school attendance and by providing better facilities for the intellectually and physically disabled. The government legislated to allow women to serve in the police force and as justices of the peace, while it also improved workers' access to the arbitration system and diminished the court's punitive powers against trade unions. A wheat pool was created, as were land and housing schemes for war veterans. However, the government also passed a law designed to close Lutheran primary schools.

He resigned from the Labor Party in 1917 in support of Billy Hughes' proposal for conscription, and was a founding member of the National Labor Party in 1917. Andrew Kirkpatrick replaced Vaughan as leader of the official Labor Party. Vaughan remained as premier atop a minority government until 1917, when his government was defeated in parliament over the conscription issue, with Peake becoming Premier for a third time.

Vaughan spent the last months of his term on a speaking tour of the United States, at the invitation of President Woodrow Wilson. He made a last-minute decision to recontest his seat the 1918 election as an independent, while still overseas – despite having formally been leader of the National Party until that point. However, he was unsuccessful in holding his seat, and retired from South Australian politics.

Crawford had a literary bent: he was a freelance journalist and for a time editor of Quiz{{cite news |url=https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article108378322 |title=City Scratchings. |newspaper=Kapunda Herald (SA : 1878–1951) |location=SA |date=17 August 1906 |access-date=13 January 2015 |page=5 |via=Trove}} before taking up politics, and in later life had two books published: Golden Wattle Time published in Sydney 1942 by Frank Johnson and The Last of Captain Bligh published in London 1950 by Staples Press. He was also the author of radio scripts.Arnold, John The Bibliography of Australian Literature, Vol 4, P-Z p. 586 University of Queensland Press 2009 {{ISBN|0702240311}}

He moved to Sydney after leaving parliament, where he developed a number of business interests. In retirement, he devoted much of his time to his literary interests. He died at his home in Sydney in 1947, and was awarded a state funeral by the government of South Australia.

In 1906 he married Evelyn Goode, sister of parliamentary colleague Clarence Goode. After her death in 1927 he remarried in 1934 to Millicent Preston-Stanley, the first woman to be elected to the Parliament of New South Wales.

{{Reflist}}

• [http://www.adb.online.anu.edu.au/biogs/A120350b.htm Australian Dictionary of Biography]

• {{cite SA-parl |pid=3968 |name=Vaughan, Crawford |former=yes |access-date=19 August 2022}}

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Category:Australian Labor Party members of the Parliament of South Australia

Category:1874 births

Category:1947 deaths

Category:Premiers of South Australia

Category:Leaders of the opposition in South Australia

Category:Treasurers of South Australia

Category:Members of the South Australian House of Assembly