How Did Eddie Mabo Win The High Court Of Australia

In the 1971 Gove land rights case, Justice Blackburn ruled that Australia was terra nullius prior European settlement. This judgement was challenged for a total of 3 years but all attempts failed. However, on the 20th May 1982, Eddie Koiki Mabo and 4 other Indigenous people began their legal claim for ownership of their traditional lands on the island of Mer in the Torres Strait. The case was later taken to supreme court and after ten years, the case was closed and the government granted the indigenous people of australia their rightful land. Before this, Eddie had been helping his community from a young age.

When the Europeans first arrived in Australia, Indigenous Australians lost all their land rights. This was mainly due to the Europeans claiming that Australia was Terra nullius. Terra Nullius was a international law stating that if territory was not owned, it was to be given to the first nation to discover it and entitled to take over. The Europeans did not recognise the Aboriginals and Torres Strait islander people as the traditional owners of Australia and therefore took all there land rights. The indigenous people were then constricted by the terra nullius rule from 1788 to 1991.

The Mabo Decision was a turning point for the recognition of the rights of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders. From recognising ownership of traditional lands to raising awareness of racial discrimination, it affected the Indigenous Australian society in various ways. Firstly, the Mabo Decision was significant because it acknowledged the ownership of traditional lands by abolishing “terra nullius”, meaning that the land is empty and owned by no one. Previously, the British denied the Indigenous Australians' connection and ownership of the land by declaring that Australia was "terra nullius". However, on the 3rd of June, 1992, the High Court decided that the Merriam people were "entitled as against the whole word to possession, occupation

Their island in the Torres Strait was at a possible risk of building being built on the island and the indigenous people and Mabo wanted to make sure that didn’t happen and that they could keep it safe. The Meriam people believed that they were the original owners of the land as well as the nearby seas and that the non-indigenous Australians had no land right to the land. The court case took 10 years of fighting by the Meriam people, and most importantly and especially Eddie Mabo. Finally on June 3rd 1992 the Meriam people were announced the true owners of the island and they were granted their land rights. This case gave many other Indigenous people an opportunity in life and gave others courage to stand up for themselves and their land which worried the government as much of the disputed land was being used for profitable purposes.

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 1992 Mabo High Court case represents one of the most profound cases in Australian history leading to the turning point of Reconciliation for Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders. As a result of this decision, it changed the legislation of the indigenous Australians introducing land rights and impacted the indigenous Australians society rights and freedom as a more desirable outcome in the movement towards Reconciliation. The 1992 Mabo court case was a pivotal turning point in the progressive Reconciliation in Australia. It paved the pathway for Indigenous land rights and confronted the state of Queensland and Australian commonwealth to regain their freedom and equality.

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.

“Wave Hill was a major step on the long road towards equality between settlers and indigenous Australians,” says Professor Deborah Rose, an anthropologist at the University of New South Wales in Sydney (Dineley, 2013). This situation of land theft by the white settlers was, and still is to this day, a very prominent issue and unfortunately many did not have the same resolution as the Gurindji strike. This strike was seen as "the first claim for traditional Aboriginal land in Australia (Korff, Jens. 2014). " A very giant step forward and the beginning of Aboriginal land rights occurred on August 16, 1975, five years after the start of the Gurindji strike, Prime Minister Gough Whitlam in the Labor party handed over the entitled land to the Gurindji people. This event carved the path for the Northern Territory land rights act of 1975 and in the same year the Gurindji people were able to purchase the pastoral lease for the Gurindji land and the developing in to the Gurindji people gaining the free hold title to the waterhole on Wattie Creek in 1986, which is where the Gurindji people stayed after leaving the cattle station during the strike in 1966.

One of the most significant events in Aboriginal peoples struggle for rights in Australia was the Mabo decision in 1992. This event took away the myth of terra nullius from Australian law and would recognise rights that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples have to the land and waters according to tradition. Thus, creating way for the legal recognition of native land titles (Loos & Mabo, 2013). This essay will explain the impact of the Mabo decision, what events led to this event and what impact this has on Australian people today.

[9] The authors contend that the Australian Constitution has historically been used to marginalize Indigenous Australians and that any attempts at constitutional change must be cognizant of this history. The authors argue that the current constitutional framework in Australia needs to be revised to address Indigenous issues, particularly concerning the recognition of Indigenous rights and the participation of Indigenous Australians in the political process. They contend that a First Nations Voice to Parliament and a Makarrata Commission are essential components of constitutional change in Australia. They would provide a framework for Indigenous self-determination and recognizing Indigenous

The High Court hearings concluded in May 1991 and then took many months before the verdict was finally announced in June 1992. By a majority of six-to-one, the High Court ruled a landmark decision that made native title to land recognised by the common law of Australia. This monumental finding overlooked the notion that when the land was, so they say, ‘discovered’ by Captain Cook in 1778 it was terra nullius, or uncivilised

The situation no longer directly affected the Non-Indigenous Australians, as Non-Indigenous Australians had thought that the process of reconciliation was complete, with the matters of the Indigenous Australians now handed over to the Australian Government. Over the course of the next 10 years, the nation became apathetic towards indigenous affairs, however public interest was revived in 1982 when Eddie Mabo, an Indigenous land rights activist and several others challenged action against the State of Queensland and the Commonwealth of Australia in the High Court over Indigenous land rights in the Murray Islands. This gained massive media coverage, as it was the first time that the issue of Indigenous land rights had been raised at a federal level. At this time, it was unexpected, as many, again, believed that the altering of the constitution had closed the seal on reconciliation. It was not a high priority for the Government who, at the time, was trying to meet the political demands driven by the public to fix the Australian economy, which whilst booming, was leaving thousands unemployed, with high-interest rates, a catalyst for impending disaster.

After 1788 Aboriginals became outcasts to their own lands. The European settlers tried to change and destroy Indigenous ways of life, however they did not succeed. Aboriginals survived and tried to fight back for their rights to their land. There are many stories in this long fight for justice. Charles Perkins and the Freedom Ride is one of the most famous stories in Australia’s history.

The award winning novel, The White Earth, thoughtfully written by Andrew McGahan and published in 2004, explores the early history of Australia. This novel effectively gives a silent voice to the Aborigines who were mistreated after they were separated from their land. Shockingly, the

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.