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The International Labour Organisation adopts convention 107, ‘Convention Concerning the Protection and Integration of Indigenous and Other Tribal and Semi-Tribal Populations in Independent Countries’. -
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Indiginous Rights of Aborigional's in Australia
Timline on changing rights and freedoms for Aborigional people in Australia. -
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The Northern Territory Welfare Ordinance 1953 comes into operation. Aboriginal-Australian Fellowship petition campaign begins. A petition drafted by Jessie Street for a referendum to alter two clauses of the Constitution is launched by the Aboriginal-Australian Fellowship at the Sydney Town Hall. This begins a decade long campaign.
Aboriginal people of the Warburton–Laverton Ranges area are reported to be starving. These reports cause great public controversy and raise questions of federal and s -
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Federal Council for Aboriginal Advancement established in Adelaide on the weekend of 15–16 February.
Albert Namatjira is found guilty of supplying liquor to a relative who was a ward of the state. The resulting outcry draws attention to weaknesses of Northern Territory legislation that creates a division between Aboriginal ‘wards’ and Aboriginal ‘citizens’. -
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Albert Namatjira dies, eight months after being charged with supplying alcohol to a ward, reigniting investigations into government approaches to Aboriginal Australians whose citizenship is constrained by state and territory legislation.
The Social Services Act is amended making old age pensions and maternity benefits available to most Aboriginal Australians. The remaining restrictive clause is that such benefits would not be available to people who are ‘nomadic’ or ‘primitive’. These terms are -
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The United Nations Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Peoples is passed. It arguesthat ‘all peoples have the right to self-determination; by virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development’.In Greensboro, North Carolina, four black students begin a sit-in at a lunch counter, sparking a method of protest that spreads to other segregated public places across America’s South.In South Africa, -
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A meeting of federal and state ministers responsible for Aboriginal welfare agree on a policy of assimilation, as defined by the Federal Minister for Territories, Paul Hasluck.As South Africa leaves the British Commonwealth to avoid expulsion over its apartheid laws, Prime Minister Menzies publicly defends South Africa’s right to pass such laws.At the Federal Council for Aboriginal Advancement meeting in Brisbane the Aboriginal delegates move that ‘we must abolish apartheid in our own country -
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‘Freedom rides’ take place on buses through America’s South in order to challenge racial segregation.By 1961, 17 new African nations havebeen admitted into the United Nations.The representation of Asian nations has also grown to 20, making the Afro-Asian group the largest voting bloc in the UN. -
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Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people receive the right to vote in federal elections.National Petition Campaign. FCAATSI launches a national campaign for a referendum to change the Constitution. From 1964 various proposals for constitutional amendment are debated until the Holt government finally agree in February 1967 to hold a referendum.Bauxite mining becomes an issue for the residents of Mapoon. -
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The Yolngu people of Yirrkala send bark petitions to Canberra. The petition is signed by nine representatives of the various clan groups with interest in the land under threat from mining. -
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In April, Martin Luther King is arrested during a protest in Birmingham, Alabama. In August, Martin Luther King delivers his famous ‘I have a dream’ speech to more than 200,000 protestors at the March on Washington. -
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The North Australian Workers Union presents a case for equal wages for Aboriginal pastoral workers. -
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n July, America’s President Lyndon Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act of 1964, prohibiting discrimination based on race, colour, religion or national origin.Martin Luther King receives the Nobel Peace Prize.In South Africa, Nelson Mandela is sentenced to life imprisonment for sabotage and attempting to overthrow the South African government. -
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In February, Malcolm X, founder of the Organisation of Afro-American Unity, is murdered.In August, America’s President Lyndon Johnson signs the 1965 Voting Rights Act, removing the restrictions which had made it difficult for Southern blacks to register to vote.In August, 34 people die after riots and looting erupt in Watts, Los Angeles, an area of extremely high black unemployment and poverty.The Queensland Aborigines’ and Torres Strait Islanders Affairs Act finally removes the barriers prohi -
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Harold Holt takes over as Prime Minister.In March Aboriginal pastoral workers are awarded equal wages, but the industry is not required to comply until December 1968.In August Vincent Lingiari leads more than 80 stockmen and their families in a walk-off at Wave Hill station. -
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Black Panther Party is founded by Huey Newton and Bobby Seale.Stokely Carmichael of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) coins the term ‘Black Power’. -
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27 May referendum. The Australian people vote to change the Constitution so that Aboriginal people can be formally counted in the census of the population of Australia, and to give the Commonwealth Government and Parliament power to make laws affecting Aboriginal people.90.77 per cent vote to delete section 127, and amend clause 51 (xxvi). This is the culmination of a decade-long campaign for these changes. -
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Split in FCAATSI, National Tribal Council established. Growing frustration at white control of the multi-racial organisations such as the Victorian Aborigines Advancement League and FCAATSI comes to a head at the 1970 FCAATSI Easter conference. While the motions for Indigenous control of the Federal Council are not successful the national movement is split with the formation of the National Tribal Council.Captain Cook Bi-Centenary. While non-Indigenous Australians celebrate, Aboriginal Australi -
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In South Africa, the Bantu Homelands Citizenship Act forces more than three million people to resettle in one of ten ‘Bantu Homelands’.In New Zealand, militant Maori activist group Nga Tamatoa (The Young Warriors) is formed. -
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Yirrkala people lose case.Mr Justice Blackburn rules against the Yirrkala people in their case against Nabalco and the Commonwealth of Australia. The Yolngu people are shocked and angered at this outcome. -
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The Aboriginal Tent Embassy.Aboriginal activists outraged by Prime Minister William McMahon’s refusal to acknowledge an Indigenous right to land set up their beach umbrella and hang from it a sign: ‘Aboriginal Embassy’.The protest grows. Footage shownof confrontations with police pulling down the tents swells the numbers of supporters, bringing together urban activists and people from remote communities in the Northern Territory. -
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The Trail of Broken Treaties, a protest organised by the American Indian Movement and other First Nations groups, sees over 800 people travel across the United States to Washington, DC. -
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The National Aboriginal Consultative Committee (NACC) is established.The NACC is set up as a move towards Aboriginal representation. People over 18 who class themselves as Aboriginal, and are recognised as such by their community, are eligible to vote.Its role is only advisory.Aboriginal Land Rights Commission established. The Aboriginal Land Rights Commission, headed by Justice Woodward, is set up by the government of Gough Whitlam to establish ways for Aboriginal people to get land rights i -
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In Canada, the Supreme Court recognises that Nisga’a Indians held native title to their lands before the creation of British Columbia.At the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota, about 200 supporters of the American Indian Movement reclaim the village of Wounded Knee and announce the creation of the Oglala Sioux Nation. United States armed forces surround the group in a siege that lasts 71 days. -
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In New Zealand, Waitangi Day becomes a national holiday, after three years of campaigning by Nga Tamatoa,a militant Maori organisation. -
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Prime Minister Gough Whitlam returns land to the Gurindji people. More than a decade after the walk-off from Wave Hill station, 3300 square kilometres of land is returned to traditional owners.
