Edward Mabo Case Study

They had their own traditional laws and customs and held a very strong and deep-rooted connection to their land. The British policy of the land being terra nullius, or “nobody’s land”, infringed the rights and customs of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. The concept of terra nullius robbed the Indigenous population of their right to have possession of their traditional and revered land. Mabo firmly believed it was not the white government’s responsibility to deny rights to traditional Indigenous land.

Eddie Mabo was a Torres Strait Islander who believed Australian laws and land ownership were wrong and fought to change them. On 20 May 1982, Eddie Mabo, Sam Passi, David Passi, Celuia Mapo Salee and James Rice began their legal claim for ownership of their lands against the Queensland Government. In 1985, while the Mabo case was proceeding, the Queensland Government tried to avoid the issue of whether rights of Indigenous peoples survived colonisation. Due to this the leader of the Queensland Government Joh Bjelke-Petersen decided to introduce the Queensland Coast Islands Declaratory Act 1985. This Act had claimed to extinguish any rights and interests that the Meriam people may have had before its enactment.

In the 1980’s, national campaigns for land rights laws began and Eddie spoke at a 1981 land rights conference on land rights in the Torres Straits. On hearing his speech, Lawyer, H. C. ‘Nugget’ Coombs, encouraged Eddie and other Meriam people to establish ownership of their lands through the High Court of Australia, and on 20 May 1982, Koiki and four other Meriam Men began their fight for ownership of their lands on Murray and Dauar Islands through the Australian High Court. Koiki was named the first plaintiff, so the case became known as the Mabo Case. Research grants from AIATSIS helped out with the case, but the Queensland Government introduced a sneaky new law in 1985 to crush their chances for native title. Koiki and his colleagues challenged this new law and won, as the High Court found in 1988, this new Queensland law breached Australian racial discrimination laws—Mabo v. Queensland [No. 1].

The state of Queensland (1992) is of great important to the land rights movement. In 1982, Eddie Koiki Mabo and a group of others took the government to court, as they wanted a legal recognition of the land because their ancestors and families had lived there. The Mabo case has a spiritual significance, as in the court Mabo and his fellow plaintiffs repeatedly quoted stories and morals related with Mambo’s ancestral deity and they explained how the land is related to their ancestors and has a significant importance. Father Dave Passi, another plaintiff in the case said “It is my father’s land, my grandfather’s land. I am related to it, it gave me my identity.

The Mabo Decision was the turning point for the recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander rights. Firstly, the Mabo Decision was significant because the decision was the lead up to the recognition of Aboriginal Rights. The Mabo Decision was the movement that made everyone fully recognise the Aboriginal people as humans, and official citizens of the country. The Decision also raised awareness to the discrimination the Aboriginal people were facing before the referendum.

Charles Perkins, born in Alice Springs 1936, was a controversial leader within the Aboriginal community. Perkins was known both for this willingness to fight for what he believed in, and his determination, although this confidence brought him into conflict with community leaders and the government. Perkins was involved in the ‘Freedom Ride’ travelling through rural New South Wales in the early 60’s. This ride was a significant contribution highlighting the predicament the Aboriginals faced. Being Aboriginal himself, this ride demonstrated that Aboriginal people could stand up for themselves.

We are gathered here today, in loving memory of the greatest prime minister to ever grace Australian soil. Gough Whitlam broke a 23-year-old dry spell for the labour party and although his term in office was a mere three years, in that three years he did more than any other prime minister ever has and truly began to shape the Australia we live in today. From humble beginnings, to fighting for Australia, Whitlam was a man of great courage and will and for that his legacy will transpire long past his time. FIRST BODY PARA: ‘Terra Nullius’ the two words that initiated white superiority in Australia for over 100 years. Gough Whitlam was the first Australian prime minister to accept instead of oppress and put an end to a previously idealistic

This correlates to the ideology of heritage and identity within Australia. Australia was known as terra nullius (land unoccupied) when European settlers colonised due to their belief that indigenous Australians were a different race similar to fauna (Byrne 2003). Jones and Harris (1998) expand on this notion with the idea that European settlers deemed themselves the first occupiers of Australian land due to their discourse surrounding the permanency and entitlement of land ownership. This Euro-centric construct of land ownership is discussed within the article with specific importance placed colonials concept of being an inheritor of the land rather than an invader and also the historical European concept of racial identities and their link to ‘the nation’ (Byrne 2003, p. 78). It was seen that because the indigenous Australians didn’t comply to the settler’s social construct of home, then the land wasn’t owned and therefore any remains were also free for the taking.

Charles Perkins was an activist who spent most of his life fighting for Indigenous people and their rights. He pushed himself out into a world full of racism, to raise awareness of the issues Indigenous people are facing in education, housing, health and their employment. He was a national spokesperson fighting for the rights of Indigenous people throughout Australia. Perkins through his Freedom Rides fought against racial discrimination towards Indigenous Australians and fought for the concept of ‘closing the gap’, pushing the idea of equal opportunities for Indigenous people and non-Indigenous people inside education and within the community. Charles Nelson Perkins was born in Alice Springs in 1936 to an Arrente mother, Hetty and Kalkadoon father, Connelly .

Other countries were also critical of the casual racism that this policy created. The intention of this essay is to argue that the White Australian policy had a significant impact on Australian culture and Australian attitude towards multiculturalism. Furthermore, this essay intends to prove that the White Australia Policy was a tragedy for Australian Multiculturalism. The White Australian policy included such acts as: the immigration restrictions act 1901 and the Pacific Islanders Labourers act 1901.

Oodgeroo Noonuccal’s non-traditional view of Australia in ‘An Appeal’ shows how stereotypes of Australia are not always correct. The poem shows how camaraderie and mateship are not always expressed in Australian lifestyle. It is evident in the poem that not all Australians help each other to get through tough times and Australia is divided into different groups of people and is not equal. ‘An appeal’ shows how the nation stands up for themselves and fight for what is right against the power of the ‘not really’ authoritative people of Australia. The concept of inequality is a crucial part of Oodgeroo Noonuccal’s poem ‘An Appeal’.

This article discusses the speech given by an Indigenous journalist, Stan Grant who participated in a debate where he spoke for the motion “Racism is destroying the Australian Dream’’. Hence, the main points of this article are mostly evidence given by Grant in his debate to support his idea that the Australian Dream is indeed rooted in racism. One of the main points is that the indigenous Australians are often excluded and disregarded as non-Australians simply due to their race and skin colour. Grant pointed out the incident where AFL player Adam Goodes was publicly jeered and told that he did not belong to his country as he was not an Australian despite the fact that Australia indeed is the land of his ancestors.

Life as an Indigenous Person in Early Australia Mabo was born into an Australia of racism and inequality, where hope within the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people was seemingly nonexistent. Mabo was born in 1936, over a decade before Indigenous Australians were considered Australian citizens and 39 years before the eventual removal of the infamous White Australia Policy (Jupp, 2006). The Story of Eddie Mabo

For Ben Hall a young man, the evolving and progressive society of Australia presented an opportunity for the adventurous to have ago and to build a solid foundation for the future without the social judgments that long been a handicap for those of limited means and wherein some sections of Australian society there still retained the structured aristocracy of the old country where title and inherited wealth determined a path of diversity for those that were termed privileged, this, of course, excluded Ben Hall. It was for those in Australia with courage and determination that the land could offer them that same opportunity of position in the new aristocracy of the colony which was being forged out of the criminals of England who had been bound down by iron chains and where the land for those ex-convicts presented a new wealth for men marked long ago and sent to this penal land for crimes that were so petty that in a modern Australia or England would not ever see the courthouse let alone seven to fourteen years incarcerated with severe physical punishment.

The Mabo decision changed the legal, political and social relationships between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people. In recognising the traditional rights of Murray Islanders it changed Australia forever. The Mabo decision opened the doors for other indigenous people and groups to be able to claim ownership of land. They were required to prove that they had continuous connection to the land and maintained their traditional associating with it. The 'native title ' is the recognition by law that some aboriginal and torres strait islander people have rights to certain land due to their traditional laws and customs.