cnap. 11] THE COMMONWEALTH OF AUSTRALIA 925 
either House can take the initiative in requiring a referendum 
as to constitutional alterations? 
Tt will be seen at once how very wide the power of alteration 
is, and how easily on the whole it can be exercised. Ap- 
parently all the Constitution can be changed, but this view 
must not be pressed too far; for example, the purpose of 
the Act is expressed in the preamble, which with the enacting 
clauses is not subject to change ; the purpose of the enact- 
ment is to create an indissoluble Federal Commonwealth 
under the Crown of the United Kingdom, and therefore the 
Constitution must still provide for the subordination of all 
authority to the Crown. Nor can the provisions in the Act as 
to ss. 5, 7, and 8, which are still in force, be altered, providing 
as they do for the operation of the laws of the Commonwealth, 
the validity and maintenance of the Acts of the Federal 
Council, and the application of the Colonial Boundaries Act, 
1895, to the Commonwealth. Nor again on general princi- 
ples may we believe that the Parliament can extinguish itself ; 
the enacting clauses also refer to the action of the Parlia- 
ment, and it may fairly be said that there must be a Parlia- 
ment, as indeed there would certainly require to be in some 
form or other. But the power of change is very great, and 
there has already been introduced a Bill into the Parliament 
in the session of 1910 which expresses the wishes of those 
who would abolish the states as now composed, and vest the 
whole power of the Commonwealth in the Commonwealth 
Parliament, supplementing it by local Councils throughout 
Australia, which would normally manage local affairs, 
though, unlike the states, they would be subject to the 
paramount legislative supremacy of the Commonwealth, 
which thus could insist upon a general policy in these 
matters, in which uniformity is of importance.® 
The mode of altering the Constitution is of remarkable 
simplicity, and distinguishes the Commonwealth Constitution 
trom the Constitution onwhich it is so largelyin some respects 
' ¢f. Quick and Garran, op. cit., pp. 986 seq. 
2 The Bill was not seriously pressed : it is mainly a transcript from the 
South, Africa Act. 1909. Cf. Turner. Australian Commonwealth, p. 307.