Only if you are totally ignorant of history. My Australian state wasn't settled by convicts just as the whole of the US wasn't settled by one ship full of Puritans. My state had a planned colonisation by free settlers attracted to civil and religious freedom and the promise of owning their own land which probably had more in common with somewhere like New Zealand than the penal colonies to the east.

Not only that, but the colony in Sydney had a civil legal system in place from almost day one, even though there were only marines and convicts about. Infact the very first civil case was bought against the British government by a female convict concerning belongings stolen en-route. She won.

The captain of the first fleet, and governor of the first colony, fought for this against Lord Howe of the Admiralty before the fleet had left England.

It's just Americans thinking they're being funny about Australia, which is ironic given their modern-day extremely high levels of incarceration. Even the 'penal colonies' weren't just penal colonies - there were a hell of a lot of free settlers as well. Then the gold rushes hit and that's when things really took off.

Besides, in the same period we were a 'penal colony', the Americans were 'slavers' - so much for not casting the first stone...

You're assuming I'm in the USA.

I didn't write, imply or say at all that every person from day one until now was a prisoner obviously not but I figured the subject would be viewed differently in Australia.

I am assuming that you're from the USA, since most comments like that come from Americans, and it's supported by the point you highlighted that comment but didn't deny it.

Besides, I didn't say that all americans were slavers. That's not the point I'm making. Your 'considering Australia's history' comment isn't "viewed differently in Australia", it's just flat-out wrong. It's servicing a bigoted stereotype ("people from X are Y, dontcha know") rather than reflecting history.

In any case, Australia was federated on Jan 1 1901 - that's when the constitution describing this came into play - a full half-century after the end of the penal colony years, in itself a period of immense immigration. Considering this history, why is it odd that people convicted of a lengthy sentence be barred from holding high office?

I'm Canadian.

I guess we're both guilty of being ignorant of distant lands.

Meh, justify it that way if you need to - I was making an assumption based on observed behaviour, you were working from an inaccurate sterotype from 200 years ago.

You were too.