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by lodging over 200 objections to the electoral roll in order to delay the elections or at least expose malpractice by
the Labor candidates. The Electoral Office dismissed most of the objections as frivolous, and Roberts was forced,
under threat of heavy penalties, to withdraw the rest.
In 1919, he was briefed by the Administrator, Dr J A Gilruth, and the Commonwealth to prosecute Nelson and
Robert Munro Balding, secretary of the Amalgamated Carpenters and Joiners Union, for assaulting Inspector Waters
during the Government House riot in December 1918. Roberts advised against the prosecution, as to do so would
make martyrs of Nelson and Balding, the local magistrate was likely only to impose a fine, or commit for trial in
the Supreme Court, and trial by jury was ‘unthinkable’. He advised special retrospective legislation to enable the
defendants to be tried in Melbourne. However, the Commonwealth ignored this advice and Roberts was forced
to lay the necessary informations in February 1919. These were dismissed by Edward Copley Playford SM as
Waters was held not to be performing his duties under the Crimes Act 1914 (Commonwealth). Roberts, acting on
instructions from the Minister, laid fresh informations under the Police Act 1869. These prosecutions succeeded,
and Playford SM fined both defendants, but Acting Justice Herbert quashed the convictions on appeal to the
Supreme Court.
On 11 April 1919, Roberts married Ella Sicklemore (1886–1975) of Launceston, Tasmania, at Christ Church
Cathedral, Darwin. He had two sons, Ian Donald (born 1921) and Thomas Chesterman (born 1924).
With the removal of Justice Bevan from office in September 1920 following the Ewing Royal Commission’s
report in April, the Commonwealth publicly advertised the position of Judge, and Roberts (who had also applied
for the position of Administrator) was appointed as only the second permanent Judge of the Supreme Court of the
Northern Territory on 11 November 1921 although he was not sworn in until 1 December. At 32 years of age, he
is still the youngest person ever to be appointed as a Judge of any Australian Superior Court.
Although a supporter of the Gilruth administration, Roberts was critical of his predecessor, Justice Bevan,
whom he thought gave the impression of lacking judicial independence by appearing to be subordinate to Gilruth.
Roberts went to considerable lengths to impress upon the public his own judicial independence, although he did
maintain friendly relations with Urquhart, the Administrator from 1921 to 1927, even to the extent of regularly
playing tennis at Government House.
Roberts fought the Administration over control of the courthouse and the Supreme Court library, even to the
extent of ordering alterations being made to the jury room to provide accommodation for the Territory’s first
Crown Law Officer, Algernon Charles Braham, to be stopped, whilst he tried to have Braham evicted. Roberts had
no time for Braham, whom he considered inept, and he loathed Charles Barnett Story, the Government Secretary
and permanent head of the Northern Territory Public Service. Roberts was privately very critical of the personnel
the Commonwealth chose to run the Territory, and of the Commonwealth’s methods of government, and used
every opportunity to give voice to his criticisms. Not even a rebuke from the Secretary of the Home and Territories
Department, in January 1923, over criticisms he had made of the Commonwealth Railways, made any difference.
Although he lost control of the courthouse, he won control over the library, and he succeeded in having Stipendiary
Magistrate and Supreme Court Registrar Major Gerald Hogan, whom he also disliked, transferred to New Guinea
in 1922.
A number of civil actions during his period of office also became the vehicle to test judicial independence
and to voice criticism of Story, Braham, Hogan and Copley Playford SM, although it is fair to say that Mallam
made the bullets for Roberts to fire. In 1922, he ordered the Darwin District Licensing Bench, of which Hogan
SM was chairman, to receive plans for a publican’s licence at Emungalan. Hogan had argued that there was no
jurisdiction to grant a publican’s licence north of the 15th parallel of south latitude, following the government’s
nationalisation of the hotels in 1915. Roberts rejected the argument, basing his decision on amendments to the
Licensing Act passed in 1921. The decision ultimately led to the abandonment of all government involvement in
the hotel industry. In 1924 in a case involving a Board of Inquiry set up by the Administrator to enquire into the
conduct of a nurse at the Darwin Hospital, he set aside the Board’s proceedings, and held that Braham, the Board’s
Chairman, as well as the other Board members (all appointed on Story’s recommendation) were disqualified by
bias. He was particularly critical of both Braham and Story, prohibited the Board from sitting further on the case,
and ordered Story personally to pay the nurse’s legal costs.
Later the same year, he heard an appeal from a conviction by Playford SM of a charge brought by Story against
an engineer who allegedly assaulted Story on the Esplanade. Roberts allowed the appeal on the basis that Playford,
(who was then Director of Lands and Mines, and Story’s subordinate) was precluded from hearing the case, as
there was a real likelihood of bias. Story also challenged Roberts’ ability to deal with the case on the basis that
Roberts was biased against him, but Roberts dismissed this claim, asserting that he was not biased against Story,
(although his private writings would show otherwise) and in any event, there was no other Judge to hear the appeal.
Story sought leave to appeal to the High Court, but this was refused. Nelson, who had in 1922 been elected as the
Territory’s sole member of the House of Representatives, used the result to criticise Story in Federal Parliament.
By this time, any animosity between Roberts and Nelson had gone.
This led Story to resign in order to contest the 1925 Federal Election, but Nelson easily defeated him, and Story
left the Territory humiliated. Roberts also made sure that his complaints about Braham reached the ears of the
politicians in Melbourne. After Braham had been posted a defaulter by the Western Australian Turf Club in 1926
Roberts predicted that Braham’s appointment would not be extended, and this proved correct. It is fair to say that
most of the men Roberts thought little of, with the exception of Playford, had serious personal and professional
shortcomings.
In 1926, the Commonwealth divided the Northern Territory into two territories, the Territory of North Australia,
and the Territory of Central Australia, by the passage of the Northern Australian Act, 1926. The Act also created