South Australia's history of voting rights for Aboriginal AustraliansAlthough South Australia has led the way many times for the rights of Aboriginal Australians, the state has also brought about some cruel and inhumane laws.
This is a look at some of the pinnacles and plummets for Aboriginal Australians to hold their right to vote in South Australia.
In 1834 the South Australia Act was drafted to create laws to allow the sale of land to help fund the building of the colony, SA Migration Museum director Mandy Paul said.
"The debate about land rights was set up right from the beginning of the colony," she said.
Quote:"[The Act] included the observation that lands were waste[lands] and unoccupied and supposedly fit for colonisation."
And although it neglected to mention original owners of the land, the Letters Patent of 1836 (which enacted the 1834 Act) contained specific references.
It read in part:
Quote: "Provided always that nothing in these our Letters Patent contained shall affect or be construed to affect the rights of any Aboriginal Natives of the said Province to the actual occupation or enjoyment in their own persons or in the persons of their descendants of any Lands therein actually occupied or enjoyed by such Natives."
"The [Letters Patent] basically recognised the proprietary rights of Aboriginal people to the soil," Ms Paul said.
That recognition was a result of intense negotiation between those wishing to establish a colony and liberals wanting to acknowledge original ownership, she said.
Aboriginal men given right to vote in 1856Next was the passing of the 1851 Act for Better Government, which separated South Australia's governance from New South Wales.
State representatives set about reform and one of the first pieces of legislation passed was the South Australian Constitution in 1856, which included the right for all men to vote.
"South Australia ended up with what was, for the time, a very radical constitution," Ms Paul said.
"All men over 21, including Aboriginal men, apart from those who were in jail, could vote. In the world, at that time, that was really something."
But it wasn't until 1896, two years after all women were given the right to vote, that the first Indigenous vote was recorded.
In the research book Black Fellow Citizens: Aborigines And The Commonwealth Franchise, Pat Stretton and Christine Finnimore recorded 81 of the 102 enrolled Aboriginal Australians at Raukkan voted.
Point McLeay Mission Station in 1905, showing the country side and several stone buildings. Point McLeay mission station was the first location Aboriginal men and women were observed voting in SA in 1896.(State Library of South Australia)
Their right to vote was not always observed, however.
"Through administrative practice, Aboriginal people could be disenfranchised and were frequently," Ms Paul said.
Several historical references revealed Aboriginal women were actively discouraged from voting at Raukkan in the 1896 election.
They were a 'dying race'The 1901 Constitution of the Australian Commonwealth and following Franchise Act 1902 brought with it hardships to traditional owners.
"Some historians argue that the whole idea of race and a white Australia was really one of the driving forces behind Federation in the first place," Ms Paul said.
The Commonwealth Franchise Act of 1902 which removed Aboriginal Australians' rights to vote in a federal election.
The Commonwealth Franchise Act 1902 removed Aboriginal Australians' rights to vote in a federal election.(National Archives of Australia)
The constitution refused to acknowledge Aboriginal people's existence prior to colonisation. It also excluded Aboriginal people from being included in the census.
At the time, under state legislation, Indigenous men and women were allowed to vote in both state and federal elections in South Australia.
But under the new Act, Indigenous voters were stripped of their right to vote in federal elections.
"It was commonly assumed that Aboriginal people were a dying race and that was one of the drivers of how things were structured," Ms Paul said.
A period of racist control
In a bid to protect what was believed to be an endangered population, the South Australian government created the Aborigines Act in 1911.
An excerpt of The South Australian Aborigines Act 1911 detailing the Chief Protector's custodian role.
An "It set up a period of discriminatory and racist control that was to last until 1962," Ms Paul said.
Combined with the 1923 Training of Children Act, the government could take over the welfare and placement control of every Indigenous child in the state under the age of 18.
One lasting example of racist control was the 1939 amendment which stated an Aboriginal person could denounce their heritage and no longer mix with other Indigenous people to gain exemption from the Act.
The exemption certificates issued to those who denounced their heritage soon became known as "dog licences", Ms Paul said.
Aborigines Act repealed
As part of the removal of the Aborigines Act in 1962, residents were given back their right to travel freely through the state.
"It was part of a real shift in Aboriginal people's lives," Ms Paul said.
Residents at Raukkan and Point Pearce mission stations were free to leave the camps for the first time since 1911, she said.
[cont'd]
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