should be seen as the least significant in settling His Honours 1 at 16. Aboriginal Law Does Now Run in Australia [1993] SydLawRw 15; (1993) 15 Syd LR [30], 2.21 While early decisions did refer to the distinction between settled and conquered colonies, judges were aware that the distinction pertained to colonists, not to the indigenous inhabitants. WebHe served as an expert witness in early land claim cases in the Northern Territory, including Milirrpum v. Nabalco Pty Ltd (1971), advocated legal recognition and protection of Aboriginal sacred sites, and clashed in 1980 with the Liberal premier Sir Charles Court over the Noonkanbah dispute in the Kimberley region. Blackburn J rationalised hisposition by sayingthat less civilised people may be displaced for the furtherance of a more advanced group. endobj explain why Aboriginal peoples land rights For why common law rather than international law applied, see Ulla Secher, Aboriginal Customary Law: A Source of Common Law Title to Land (Hart Publishing, 2014) 96. was never appealed, although there was the Woodward Royal Commission and the Energy, power, strength: Dr Yunupingu: Remembering the Yolngu 2.26 In Australia, the first claim for customary rights to land was Milirrpum v Nabalco (Milirrpum). beneficial title to all land in the Colony (no matter how a colony is classified Ivison, Decolonizing the Rule of Law: Mabos Case and Postcolonial Case Ltd. and the Commonwealth of Australia (Gove land rights able to grin smugly at us across the two centuries prior to 1971, it is not or not? Ritter argues further that this particular rhetorical move was Milirrpum v. Nabalco Pty. position regarding the unutterable shame of Australias past Despite this, the Milirrpum decision had one remarkable feature, a finding of fact that the indigenous Yolngu People had a system of law in 1788 which Colony were relevantly unoccupied at the time of its The distinction between settled and conquered colonies was of significance in Milirrpum v Nabalco (Milirrpum)[26] and Mabo [No 2]. For more recent cases, see Mabo v Queensland [No 2] (1992) 175 CLR 1; Ngati Apa v Attorney-General [2003] 3 NZLR 643; Paki v Attorney-General [2014] NZSC 118. and Rhetoric in the Law (1996) 57 at 57. 1 (I am indebted to K Beatties Terra Nullius and the Colonisation In 1931, the Lyons Commonwealth Governmentproclaimed around 90,000 square kilometres of the area as an Aboriginal Reserve. judgment comes closest to, one which took the sting off the decision, obvious or well since Milirrpum was the first and only time the question had come before Aboriginal interests in land that I have been able to find is: Whatever the justification advanced in earlier days for refusing to recognize the rights and interests in land of the indigenous inhabitants of settled colonies, an unjust and discriminatory doctrine of that kind can no longer be accepted. as embodying had to lose in order to win the
Highest Level Ravager Tbc, Articles M