People Australia

John Grant, n.d.

John Grant  (1857-1928) stonemason, labour activist and Senator

Birth: 24 December 1857, Abernathy, Scotland, son of crofter parents Gregor and Margaret Grant. Married: 14 May 1884, Mary Ann Kearney in Congregational Church, Sydney. They had one son. Died: 19 May 1928, Annandale, Sydney, NSW. Presbyterian. 

• Educated, primary school; apprenticed as stonemason, Glasgow.
• Arrived in Australia, 1880. Active in establishment of Stonecutters’ Union and in Operative Stonemasons Union. Held most positions including secretary. Involved in building Sydney GPO and wing of Sydney University.
• Executive member NSW Trades and Labor Council (TLC) and union delegate during 1890s strikes
• Active in formation of ALP. Member Annandale branch. General Secretary, NSW ALP (Political Labor League), 1903-1915.
• Single taxer whose influence meant that early ALP platform reflected influence of Henry George, advocated working-class mobilisation on industrial, political and ideological fronts. 1904 NSW TLC repudiated his reported suggestion, as ALP Secretary, that minimum wage was not universally enforceable due to unemployment.
• Senator, 1914-20, 1922-28 (died in office). Deputy leader of ALP in Senate.

Sources
Joan Rydon (ed), A biographical register of the Commonwealth Parliament 1901-1972 (ANU Press, 1975); Graham Freudenberg, Cause for power – the centenary history of the NSW Labor Party (Pluto Press, 1991); Raymond Markey, In case of oppression: the life and times of the Labor Council of New South Wales (Syd, 1994);  Co-operator, 7 October  1912; Worker, 8 August 1907, 19 November 1908; Westralian Worker, 25 May 1928; Geoffrey Hawker, ‘Grant, John’ in Biographical Dictionary of the Australian Senate, https://biography.senate.gov.au/john-grant/ accessed 12 July 2021.