<Tr> <Td> </Td> <Td> Resulting Prime Minister <P> Edmund Barton Protectionist </P> </Td> </Tr> <P> Edmund Barton Protectionist </P> <P> Federal elections for the inaugural Parliament of Australia were held in Australia on Friday 29 March and Saturday 30 March 1901 following Federation and the establishment of the Commonwealth of Australia . All 75 seats in the Australian House of Representatives, six of which were uncontested, as well as all 36 seats in the Australian Senate, were up for election . </P> <P> After the initial confusion of the Hopetoun Blunder, the first Prime Minister of Australia, Edmund Barton, went into the inaugural 1901 federal election as the appointed head of a Protectionist Party caretaker government . While the Protectionists came first on votes and seats, they fell short of a majority . The incumbent minority government remained in office with the parliamentary support of the Labour Party who held the balance of power, with the Free Trade Party forming the opposition . A few months prior to the 1903 election, Alfred Deakin replaced Barton who resigned to become a founding justice of the High Court of Australia . </P>

Where was australia's first federal government formed