13 Facts About Doris Blackburn

Doris Amelia Blackburn was an Australian social reformer and politician.

Doris Blackburn served in the House of Representatives from 1946 to 1949, the second woman after Enid Lyons to do so.

Doris Blackburn was married to Maurice Blackburn, a Labor MP, but he was expelled from the party in 1937 and she resigned from the party in solidarity.

However, Doris Blackburn served only a single term before being defeated.

Doris Blackburn later served as president of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom.

Doris Blackburn married Maurice Blackburn, a fellow firebrand socialist, in Melbourne on 10 December 1914 and spent their honeymoon organising anti-war and anti-conscription campaigns.

Doris Blackburn's husband continued to sit in parliament as an independent but lost his seat at the 1943 federal election to the official Labor candidate, and died the following year.

Upset at Labor's treatment of her husband, Doris Blackburn stood as an Independent Labour candidate for her husband's old seat of Bourke at the 1946 election, and by winning it she became only the second woman to be elected to the Australian House of Representatives.

In parliament Doris Blackburn, who shared the cross benches with fellow former Labor member Jack Lang, championed similar issues to those of her late husband, gaining nationwide notoriety in 1947 as the only MP to vote against the Atomic Energy Bill.

Doris Blackburn served as the national President of the Council for Civil Liberties.

Doris Blackburn subsequently remained active in social issues, serving as president of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom.

Doris Blackburn died on 12 December 1970 in Coburg, Victoria, aged 81.

Doris Blackburn had two sons and two daughters, one of which died before her.