_Hugh H. Lusk, The First Parliament of Australia (American Review of Reviews, March, 1903)_. AUSTRALIA: A. D. 1902. The "States Rights" temper. Question of constitutional relations between Commonwealth and States in external affairs, as raised by South Australia. Decision of the Imperial Government. "State-rights" questions and the provincialistic spirit behind them made a prompt appearance in the Australian Commonwealth after its federation was accomplished. One of the first wrangles to occur between the General Government and that of a State was appealed necessarily to the Imperial Government at London, because it arose out of a call from the latter, in September, 1902, for information about an incident which concerned a Dutch ship. The request for information went from London to the Commonwealth Government, and from the latter to the Government of South Australia, where the incident in question occurred, involving some act of its officials. The South Australian Ministry declined to pass the desired information through the channel of the Commonwealth Ministry, but would give it to the British Colonial Office, direct. A long triangular argumentative correspondence ensued, in the course of which much that seems like a repetition of the early history of the United States of America appears. Such as this, for example, in one of the letters of the Acting Premier of South Australia to the Lieutenant-Governor of that State: "The importance to the States, especially to the smaller States, of strictly maintaining the lines of demarcation between Commonwealth and State power is manifest. Already a movement has begun to destroy the Federal element in the Constitution. A remarkable indication of this may be gathered from a speech made by Sir William Lyne, the Commonwealth Minister for Home Affairs, at Kalgoorlie, in Western Australia, on the 2nd day of the present month. Speaking of the Constitution, Sir William Lyne said: 'If the population increased in the States as he expected, he did not think three of the larger States would still consent to be governed by four of the smaller ones. He hoped that when the time came there would not be bloodshed, but that things would settle themselves in a manner worthy of the records of the first Parliament.’ "Believing, as Ministers do, that the peaceful and successful working of the Constitution depends upon the strict maintenance of the lines of demarcation between the powers of the Commonwealth and those of the States, and that that line is drawn clearly in the Constitution, they cannot agree to the opinions of the Right Honourable the Secretary of State for the Colonies, which increase, by implication, the power of the Commonwealth, and which seem to Ministers to tend to Unification, and to a sacrifice of the Federal to the National principle."