The Dismissal, as it's known, was controversial, but not illegal.

Clause 64 of the Australian constitution ("Ministers of State") says that "the Governor-General may appoint officers to administer such departments of State of the Commonwealth as the Governor-General in Council may establish. Such officers shall hold office during the pleasure of the Governor-General."

In other words, the Governor-General giveth, and the Governor-General taketh away. Blessed be the name of the Governor-General.

But seriously.

It is the Governor-General's constitutional role to appoint Ministers - and to remove those Ministers.

In 1975, the government was coming to a stand-still. The Opposition under Malcolm Fraser was denying supply, which meant the apparatus of government was running out of money to operate. Prime Minister Gough Whitlam had been unable to find a way out of the deadlock (as far as the Governor-General was aware).

Governor-General John Kerr was obtaining private legal advice with regard to his "constitutional authority and power to make a decision of dismissal and force a dissolution [of Parliament]". For this purpose, he consulted with Chief Justice Garfield Barwick of the High Court of Australia. Chief Justice Barwick advised that "If, being unable to secure supply, [the Prime Minister] refuses to [advise a general election or resign], Your Excellency has constitutional authority to withdraw his Commission as Prime Minister." In short, Kerr had the legal power to dismiss Whitlam.

There was also precedent for this: in 1932, the Governor of New South Wales dismissed the Premier of that state. These "reserve powers", as they're called, exist in all Australia's constitutions, state and federal.

So, in 1975, Governor-General Kerr exercised those reserve powers and dismissed Prime Minister Whitlam because Whitlam was unable to perform a key function of government: obtain money from the Parliament to keep the government and public service running. He had an interview with Whitlam on the morning of the 11th November, and asked Whitlam if he intended to keep governing without supply. When Whitlam said "yes", Kerr decided that was the trigger he needed to exercise his reserve powers.

There was a lot of controversy about this. Given that Kerr delivered exactly the outcome that Fraser had been working toward (a dismissed Prime Minister), a lot of people assumed that Kerr had conspired with the opposition leader. This implied that he had made a political decision, rather than a legal decision. There's no evidence of this in the sources I've read. Kerr made his own decision, for better or worse, without consulting any politicians (although, as I said, he did get legal advice about what he was allowed to do under the constitution).

However, even if Kerr's decision was seen to be flawed by some, the legality of his actions were never seriously called into question. Most people accepted, to some degree, that the Governor-General was legally within his rights to do what he did.

It helped that, when the Governor-General appointed Fraser as an interim Prime Minister, he required Fraser to commit to two things: securing supply, and holding a new federal election as soon as possible. Fraser did both these things that same afternoon: he got Parliament to pass the supply bill, and he visited the Governor-General to advise him to dissolve Parliament and call a new election. The new election was announced the same day, and took place 30 days later.

This meant that the Australian people were given the option to elect the Prime Minister they wanted. This "lanced the boil" of bad feeling, so to speak. It's hard to accuse the Governor-General of unconscionable actions, when those very actions gave the Australian people the chance to override his decision if they wanted to. Aussies could have elected Gough Whitlam back into office, thus telling the Governor-General exactly what they thought of his actions. However, Malcolm Fraser's Coalition won in a landslide.

It's not like the Governor-General seized power for himself, or connived at a military coup. He acted constitutionally, and moved immediately to hold a democractic election.

In summary: many people were surprised by the Governor-General's decision to sack the Prime Minister, and some people decried his decision, but most people accepted that he had the legal right to do so.

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Some further reading:

• 'The Dismissal' by Paul Kelly and Troy Bramston

• 'Malcolm Fraser: The Political Memoirs' by Malcolm Fraser and Margaret Simons

• 'Matters for Judgment: An Autobiography' by John Kerr

• 'The Truth of the Matter' by Gough Whitlam