Aboriginal Rights In Australia

Since the European conquest in 1788, the Indigenous Australians have struggled to maintain their rights and freedoms. However The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders have managed to achieve significant changes and developments in their 200 year struggle for recognition, justice and the legal acknowledgment of their land rights. Some of the significant key developments in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people’s struggles for rights and freedoms include; the 1962 right to vote federally that is tied to the 1967 Referendum, the Reconciliation and the Mabo decision, The Bringing Them Home Report on the Stolen Generations and the 2008 Apology. This response will outline the significance of key developments, therefore demonstrating the …show more content…
By 1962 the Aboriginals gained the right to vote however the two sections of the Constitution that forced the government to legislate for Aboriginal Australians and barred them being accounted for in the census were removed in the 1967 referendum. On the 26th of May 1967 Australians all over the nation took part in one of the most important Referenda in the Nation’s History. The Referendum was not about citizenship or voting rights, these issues had already been tackled in previous years. The 1967 Referendum was about the eradication of the discriminatory section of the Constitution, the referendum was fundamentally deciding the place of indigenous Australians within the society. The response that came from the referendum was a great number of yes’, this surprised nations around the world who viewed Australia a racist country that was reluctant to change. The significance of this event in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples struggle for rights and freedoms is that it drove an increased momentum and desire for change among the Indigenous people. This referendum symbolises the colossal struggles they went through to attain recognition and rights. Some of the other results that came with this significant event include the public recognition of their existence and the federal law was now permitted to make and enact laws for Aboriginal people not their state governments. The significance of this key development can also be seen in two impeccable sources. Source 4 on page 380 in the Retroactive 2 history book shows a poster with written and visual information that were used in 1967 to promote the rights of the Australian aborigines and to convince people of its fair message. The poster also shows the viewer a section from the UNDHR, this supports the demand being given to go and

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