Adolphus Taylor

Adolphus George Taylor (14 June 1857 – 18 January 1900) was an Australian journalist and populist politician, active in New South Wales the 1880s and 1890s.

Early life Reputed the illegitimate son of a gentleman father, Taylor was born in Mudgee, New South Wales and was educated at the local Church of England School and became a teacher in Mudgee by 1875. He joined the New South Wales Permanent Artillery as a private, but was court-martialled for "insubordination" in 1878. He then joined or returned to the Mudgee Independent as a journalist.

Political career Taylor - "a lanky youth, dressed in a torn coat that hang from his ears" - won a surprise victory in the seat Mudgee in 1882, pushing the longtime popular hero, Sir John Robertson, into second place. He became an expert in parliamentary procedure and constitutional law, and established that George Reid's appointment as a Minister for Public Instruction in 1883 was unconstitutional, forcing Reid to stand for a by-election, which he lost. His emotional and often drunken harangues of the House led to frequent expulsions and as a result of being suspended twice in a row for a week by the Speaker, Edmund Barton, he successfully sued Barton for £1,000.

In April 1887, Taylor resigned from Parliament so that he could be appointed examiner of patents. He was re-elected to parliament as the member for West Sydney in 1890 but did not stand for the 1891 election, following widespread criticism of his delayed report of the rape of his 12-year-old maid servant by clerical imposter, James Joseph Crouch. He ran unsuccessfully for Sydney-King in 1894.

W.B. Melville recorded of Taylor, "He could discern the weaknesses of his contemporaries, he could not cure his own".