Kenneth Wheare

Sir Kenneth Clinton Wheare, (26 March 1907 – 7 September 1979) was an Australian academic, who spent most of his career at Oxford University in England. He was an expert on the constitutions of the British Commonwealth. He advised constitutional assemblies in former British colonies.

Early life and family Wheare was educated at Scotch College, Melbourne One of their sons is Tom Wheare. Another son is Henry Wheare, the champion British rower who later became a leading intellectual property lawyer in Hong Kong.

Career In 1934, Wheare was made a university lecturer in colonial history at the University of Oxford, and joined Christ Church, Oxford with a research lectureship. During his four years at Christ Church, he concentrated his research on the effects of the Statute of Westminster 1931 and the first edition of his The Statute of Westminster and Dominion Status was published in 1938. In 1939, he was elected fellow of University College, Oxford to fill the post of tutor in politics that had been vacated by John Maud.

In 1944, Wheare was elected the first Gladstone Professor of Government at All Souls College, Oxford. The Wheare committee's findings published in 1950 led to the introduction of a compulsory certificate, X (Explicit Content), allowing only those aged 16 and older to enter.

In 1956, he became Rector of Exeter College, Oxford. A gargoyle of his likeness is carved on the Bodleian Library, visible from the Exeter College Fellows' Garden.

In 1948 he had contributed Abraham Lincoln and the United States to the "Teach Yourself History" series.

In June 1973, Wheare was shortlisted for appointment as Governor-General of Australia, but was overlooked by then-prime minister Gough Whitlam in favour of Sir John Kerr.

Honours Kenneth Wheare was appointed Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George (CMG) in 1953 and was knighted in 1966.

In 2017, Oxford Brookes University named a newly rebuilt lecture hall after Wheare.