From this mess emerged the Whigs, or Liberals, and Tories, names that have kind of stuck around longer than the parties themselves. Blackadder was pretty well on the mark when discussing the rampant corruption and cronyism of the period, but the party organisations themselves survived in different forms.
By the 1770s, philosopher and parliamentarian Edmund Burke was able to describe parties as ’a body of men [sic] united for promoting by their joint endeavours the national interest upon some particular principle in which they are all agreed.’
Early days
The party system as we know it still hadn’t fully developed in 1901, when Australia held its first election. In some states parties had different names; there is still dispute over whether or not Edmund Barton’s party was the Protectionists, Liberal Protectionists, Liberals, or something else. Really, parties were describing their general philosophy, with trade policy being the big issue of the time. The affiliation of their members was loose at best, but in general Protectionists supported the Barton government and Free Traders didn’t, with Labor controlling the balance of power. Only Labor members committed to the idea of a binding, united front, all taking a pledge to abide by the party’s decisions or face expulsion. This was done to give them more voting power, and was seen as a way of punching above their weight.
This worked so well for Labor that over time the other parties began to do something similar. None of the parties had a majority, so there were constant shifts in alliance and negotiation, to the point it made Alfred Deakin irritated. He frustratingly described the three parties as 'three elevens', referring to cricket teams, asking Australians to imagine a cricket game with three teams instead of two.