he played a prominent role in parliamentary debates and proceedings. In 1856, a fully representative Legislative Assembly was established with the introduction of responsible government. Murray was duly elected to it, representing the electoral district of Southern Boroughs, and from 1859 Argyle. In 1856–1858, he sat in the New South Wales cabinet as the Secretary for Lands and Works. At one point, Murray had the opportunity to form a ministry with himself heading up the government as premier. But the move failed when Murray was unable to enlist the support of sufficient Members of Parliament, a number of whom disliked him, finding him intellectually arrogant. Substantial discrimination against Irish Catholics existed in the colony at that time, and robust Parliamentary debate involving aspersions cast against Murray's religion, can be found on the Hansard. Murray is attributed by biographer, Gwendoline Wilson, as the first colonial politician to campaign against 'transportation' and the death penalty. Murray also named Winderradeen, after a resistance leader from one of Aboriginal nations around Lake George. From 1860 to 1862, Murray served as an extremely effective and genuinely impartial speaker of the legislative assembly. Towards the end of 1862, he was appointed for life to the legislative council, which was the upper house of the New South Wales Parliament. He would serve as a distinguished president of the council until his death in 1873. Murray was a highly intelligent, extremely well-read country "squire". He owned an extensive library of books, a fine collection of furniture and other household possessions, and a comparatively liberal (if sometimes outspokenly opinionated) view of society and its institutions. His library included buddhist and other religious texts, philosophy, political science and sociology texts, and, a Quran. He was tall in stature (over 190 cm) with red hair, a swaggering walk and an imposing physical presence. Murray was also an outstanding horseman and bushman who, at the same time, liked to pursue the comfortable lifestyle of a prosperous "landed gentleman", drawing rents from the tenant farmers who occupied a large portion of Yarralumla after the abolition of assigned convict labour in the early 1840s. Marriage to Minnie Gibbes On 27 May 1843, Murray married into the Anglo-colonial establishment when he wed Mary "Minnie" Gibbes (1817–1858) at St James' Anglican Church, Sydney. English-born Mary went to live with her new husband (whom she called "Aubrey") at Yarralumla homestead; but being a cultivated and gregarious young