450 LITTLE BOURKE STREET
The High Court of Australia was inaugurated in 1903 in the Supreme Court of Victoria, but it was over twenty years before it had a dedicated building of its own from which to operate. The severe, "Stripped Classical" style building completed in 1928 was one of only a handful of public buildings undertaken in Melbourne by the Commonwealth Government's first Chief Architect, John Smith Murdoch. While his Commonwealth Offices in Treasury place were a picturesque Edwardian Baroque, the High Court (and the earlier General Post Office/ Mail Exchange in Spencer Street) represented an attempt to establish a more modern but dignified national style for Australian public buildings. The High Court building has much in common with many of Murdoch's Canberra buildings including Old Parliament House designed in 1927. Externally both buildings display a symmetrical facade, strong horizontal emphasis (lessened in the High Court by the addition of a second storey in 1935) and vestigial Classical columns and entablature. The buildings are planned as pavilions linked by corridors, and interior detailing includes coffered ceilings and timber panelling using Australian timbers.
The 1935 extensions increased accommodation at the High Court and provided offices for the Patents Office and other minor judicial bodies as well as the Melbourne offices of the Crown Solicitor.
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Among the landmark cases heard at the High Court was the challenge to the Menzies Government's Communist Party Dissolution Act (1951). The High Court determined the Act invalid, as it did not come within the inherent power of the Parliament. Other cases included those dealing with uniform taxation legislation and the Banking Acts of 1945, the Melbourne Corporation Case (1946) and the Boilermaker's Case which lead to the creation of the Commonwealth (later Australian) Conciliation and Arbitration Commission and the Commonwealth (later Australian) Industrial Court.
In 1977 the Federal Court of Australia was also accommodated at the High Court building. When the new High Court Building was opened in Canberra in 1980, the Federal Court took over the building entirely.
The recently completed Law Courts complex on the corner of William and La Trobe Streets now houses the Federal Court of Australia and the Old High Court building in Little Bourke Street has been transferred to the Supreme Court of Victoria for use as judges chambers, court rooms and the Court of Appeal Registry.