Editing Alfred Deakin (section)

===Road to Federation===
[[File:Alfred Deakin.jpg|thumb|right|upright|Alfred Deakin in 1898]]
After 1890, Deakin refused all offers of cabinet posts and devoted his attention to the movement for federation. He was Victoria's delegate to the Australasian Federal Conference, convened by Sir [[Henry Parkes]] in Melbourne in 1890, which agreed to hold an intercolonial convention to draft a federal constitution. He was a leading negotiator at the [[Constitutional Convention (Australia)|Federal Conventions of 1891]], which produced a draft constitution that contained much of the [[Constitution of Australia]], as finally enacted in 1900. Deakin was also a delegate to the second Australasian Federal Convention, which opened in Adelaide in March 1897 and concluded in Melbourne in January 1898. He was somewhat out of sympathy with the tendency of the convention, and sided with the majority in only 55 percent of divisions; fewer occasions than all but five delegates.<ref>William Coleman,''Their Fiery Cross of Union. A Retelling of the Creation of the Australian Federation, 1889–1914'', Connor Court, Queensland, 2021, p. 306.</ref> He supported wide taxation powers for the federal government, successfully opposed conservative plans for the indirect election of senators, and attempted to weaken the powers of the [[Australian Senate|Senate]], in particular seeking to prevent it from being able to defeat money bills.<ref name=adb/><ref name=apmb/> He had told the National Australasian Convention of 1891 'To introduce an American Senate into a British constitution is to destroy both'.<ref>William Coleman,''Their Fiery Cross of Union. A Retelling of the Creation of the Australian Federation, 1889–1914'', Connor Court, Queensland, 2021, p. 165.</ref> Deakin often had to reconcile differences and find ways out of apparently impossible difficulties. Between and after these meetings, he travelled through the country addressing public meetings and he was partly responsible for the large majority in Victoria at each referendum.<ref name=dab/>

In 1900 Deakin travelled to London with Edmund Barton and Charles Kingston to oversee the passage of the federation bill through the Imperial Parliament, and took part in the negotiations with [[Joseph Chamberlain]], the Colonial Secretary, who insisted on the right of appeal from the [[High Court of Australia]] to the [[Judicial Committee of the Privy Council|Privy Council]]. Eventually a compromise was reached, under which constitutional (''[[inter se]]'') matters could be finalised in the High Court, but other matters could be appealed to the Privy Council.<ref name=adb/>

Deakin defined himself as an "independent Australian Briton", favouring a self-governing Australia but loyal to the [[British Empire]]. He certainly did not see federation as marking Australia's independence from Britain. On the contrary, Deakin was a supporter of closer empire unity, serving as president of the Victorian branch of the [[Imperial Federation]] League, a cause he believed to be a stepping stone to a more spiritual world unity.