| Australian Essential Services referendum, 1926 | |
| Do you approve of the proposed law for the alteration of the Constitution entitled — "Constitution Alteration (Essential Services) 1926" ? | |
| Country: | Australia |
| Yes: | 1,195,502 |
| No: | 1,597,793 |
| Invalid: | 171,089 |
| Electorate: | 3,254,952 |
The Constitution Alteration (Essential Services) Bill 1926,[1] was an unsuccessful referendum held in 1926 that sought to alter the Australian Constitution to give the Commonwealth legislative power to protect the public from any actual or probable interruption of essential services.
Do you approve of the proposed law for the alteration of the Constitution entitled 'Constitution Alteration (Essential Services) 1926'?The proposal was to alter section 51 of the Constitution as follows:
Section fifty-one of the Constitution is altered by inserting after paragraph (v.) the following paragraph :—
(v.) a. Protecting the interests of the public in case of actual or probable interruption of any essential service.[1]
| width:180px" rowspan="2" | State | width:70px" align=center rowspan="2" | Electoral roll | width:70px" align=center rowspan="2" | Ballots issued | width:140px" align=center colspan="2" | For | width:140px" align=center colspan="2" | Against | width:70px" align=center rowspan="2" | Informal | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| width:70px" align=center | Vote | width:70px" align=center | % | width:70px" align=center | Vote | width:70px" align=center | % | |||||
| New South Wales | 1,241,635 | 1,131,656 | 545,270 | 536,734 | 49.61 | 49,652 | ||||||
| Victoria | 968,861 | 888,661 | 296,548 | 35.55 | 537,560 | 54,553 | ||||||
| Queensland | 440,632 | 399,664 | 188,473 | 184,320 | 49.44 | 26,871 | ||||||
| South Australia | 303,054 | 281,492 | 81,966 | 31.32 | 179,740 | 19,786 | ||||||
| Western Australia | 190,286 | 164,555 | 39,566 | 25.90 | 113,222 | 11,767 | ||||||
| Tasmania | 110,484 | 98,356 | 43,679 | 48.59 | 46,217 | 8,460 | ||||||
| Total for Commonwealth | noWrap | 3,254,952 | noWrap | 2,964,384 | noWrap | 1,195,502 | 42.80 | noWrap | 1,597,793 | noWrap | 171,089 | |
| Results | Obtained majority in two states and an overall minority of 402,291 votes. Not carried | |||||||||||