As Henry Knox, the United Statess first Secretary of War, advised Congress, it may be wise to extinguish with a small sum of money, a claim which otherwise may cost much blood and infinitely more money. The British government was accordingly interested to hear whether the Aborigines would put up much resistance to the occupation of Australia. 28. In one 1836 case they had the opposite effectthey elicited an extended judicial defense of terra nullius, resting on the standard justification that the Aborigines had not attained a sufficient level of civilization and social organization to possess any property rights the earliest British settlers were bound to respect. In 1763, only five years before Cook set sail, the imperial government had proclaimed that whatever land in North America had not yet been sold to the British still belonged to the Indians and could be acquired only by Crown purchase. 0000007289 00000 n 27. To strengthen our democracy as Eddie Mabo strengthened our law. Most important of all from the perspective of property rights, British settlers confirmed that Cook and Banks were right in observing that the Aborigines lacked agriculture. Report from the Committee on Immigration (Sydney: W. J. 0000006890 00000 n In 1768 the Royal Society hired James Cook to take a ship to the South Pacific to observe the transit of Venus across the sun, the measurement of which, from several parts of the world simultaneously, would help astronomers determine the distance between the sun and the earth. Quoted in Henry Reynolds, An Indelible Stain? R. v. Lowe (1827), in Decisions of the Superior Courts of New South Wales, 17881899, ed. Cook also had instructions to with Consent of the Natives take possession of territories, and had with him some hintsfrom the Earl of Morton, which included the following advice about the Indigenous occupants: They are the natural, and in the strictest sense of the word, the legal possessors of the several Regions they inhabit. Australian Museum Collection Acquisition. In denying a new trial for a defendant convicted of stealing coal from land to which the Crown had reserved the mineral rights, the court affirmed that all the ungranted land in Australia belonged to the Crown. They are frequently set down as too stupid to be taught, and barely raised above brutes, remarked the Reverend Henry William Haygarth. Bruce Kercher, An Unruly Child: A History of Law in Australia (St. Leonards, NSW: Allen & Unwin, 1995), 19. 67. An alternative plan might have been to recognize Aboriginal ownership only of certain parts of the continent, thus freeing up the rest for British settlement, and not interfering with the land titles of any existing owners. James Douglas was the president of the Royal Society. In most instances in which a country is taken possession of, and its original inhabitants are removed, enslaved, or exterminated, he noted, in a tone heavy with sarcasm, the party thus violently seizing upon the rights of others is considered the superior and more civilized nation of the two. But that did not mean the British ought to leave Australia. Torrens to Grey, Dec. 1835, CO 13/3, p. 161, PRO; First Annual Report of the Colonization Commissioners for South Australia, 14 June 1836, British Parliamentary Papers: Colonies: Australia, 4:480; Second Letter of Instructions by the Colonization Commissioners for South Australia to James Hurtle Fisher, Esq., Resident Commissioner in South Australia, 8 Oct. 1836, British Parliamentary Papers: Colonies: Australia, 5:192. The British treated Australia as terra nulliusas unowned land. Our people know han. Glen Mackie, Yam Island ManWood, glue, nails, ochre, thin steel wire, bamboo, nylon, raw cotton muslin, vinyl cut.Australian Museum Collection. 0000011176 00000 n Words like terra nullius empty land. British men would overcome their squeamishness. Berbentuk "Chapter Book" Opposition to slavery wasnt a new concept when abolitionism started. Historians believe ideas set forth during the religious movement known as the Second Great Awakening inspired abolitionists to rise up against slavery. Later as Australia grew and colonists entered the Torres Strait, Ned Mosby helped his community by protecting them through his negotiation powers and navigating the impacts of colonisation. 5. If Cook actually found such a place, the governments secret instructions read, and if there were any people living there, he was to endeavour by all proper means to cultivate a friendship and alliance with them. Cook was not to seize the land if it was inhabited. But there was another reason the doctrine had so much staying power, a reason that may have been even more important. Some of the most famous abolitionists included: As it gained momentum, the abolitionist movement caused increasing friction between states in the North and the slave-owning South. What is Mabo Day and why is it significant? - ABC News %%EOF In its first annual report to the Colonial Office, sent in 1836, the Commission promised to protect the Aborigines in the undisturbed enjoyment of their proprietary right to the soil, but immediately added: wherever such right may be found to exist. The Commission likewise declared that the location of the colonists will be conducted on the principle of securing to the natives their proprietary right to the soil, wherever such right may be found to exist. One can almost see the commissioners smiling, secure in the knowledge that they, at least, would be quite unlikely to find an Aboriginal tribe with a property right in land. Francis W. Kelsey (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1925), 202, and Samuel Pufendorf, De Jure Naturae et Gentium (1688), trans. Members of the expeditions tried to engage the Aborigines in trade, but reported no success.