Aboriginals Protection and Restriction of the Sale of Opium Act 1897

Last updated

Aboriginals Protection and Restriction of the Sale of Opium Act 1897
Coat of Arms of Queensland.svg
Parliament of Queensland
  • An Act to make Provision for the better Protection and Care of the Aboriginal and Half-caste Inhabitants of the Colony, and to make more effectual Provision for Restricting the Sale and Distribution of Opium.
Status: Repealed

The Aboriginals Protection and Restriction of the Sale of Opium Act 1897(Qld), was an Act of the Parliament of Queensland. It was the first instrument of separate legal control over Aboriginal peoples, and was more restrictive than any contemporary legislation operating in other states. It also implemented the creation of Aboriginal reserves to control the dwelling places and movement of the people.

Contents

Amendments and various pieces of replacement legislation were passed in the 20th century, but it was not until passage of the Aboriginal Land Act 1991 and Torres Strait Islander Act 1991 that the main features of the 1897 Act regarding control of land and people were replaced.

Background

By the late 19th century, many in Queensland believed that the Aboriginal peoples, greatly reduced in number because of dispersal, malnutrition, opium use, and infectious diseases, were a "dying race". Under pressure from the community, the Government of Queensland, commissioned Archibald Meston to assess the issue. Meston made a number of recommendations, some of which were the basis for the Aboriginals Protection and Restriction of the Sale of Opium Act 1897. [1] Though the Act's creators considered it a solution to a short-term problem, its administrators used it as a device for social engineering and control.

Public servants rather than politicians oversaw much of the decision-making. The individual appointed protectors for various communities had substantial autonomy in how they implemented the Act. [2]

The Act was influenced by the "Half-Caste Acts" of Victoria and Western Australia.[ citation needed ]

Effect

The Act could be used to justify definitions of Aboriginality, but even with the help of the Act, they were often contradictory and generally subject to interpretation or variation throughout the first decades after Federation. For example, in 1905, Queensland's Chief Protector of Aboriginals cited the Act to define a "half-caste" as "Any person being the offspring of an aboriginal mother and other than an aboriginal father – whether male or female, whose age, in the opinion of the Protector, does not exceed sixteen, is deemed to be an aboriginal". The Chief Protector described a "quadroon" as the "offspring" of a half-caste woman, by a "white, &c." (presumably other non-Aboriginal) father. [3]

This was the first instrument of separate legal control over Aboriginal people in Australia. According to historian Henry Reynolds, it "was far more restrictive than any [contemporary] legislation operating in New South Wales or Victoria and implemented a system of tight controls and closed reserves". [2]

Amendments and repeal

Definitions were no clearer 15 years later. The Queensland Aboriginals Department referred to "European half-caste mothers" in its 1920 Report alongside "half-breeds", "half-castes", and Aboriginals, and did not expand upon how the department made the distinction between a half-breed and half-caste, a native, and an Aboriginal. [4] Where no other information was available, white observers judged degrees of ancestry. At least in Queensland, once it had bestowed a racial category upon its charges, the Aboriginals Department treated its subjects according to their variations in skin colour.

The 1897 Act was amended in 1899, 1901, 1928, and 1934. [1] In 1939 the Aboriginals Preservation and Protection Act 1939 and the Torres Strait Islanders Act 1939 repealed previous legislation, with the main difference being a slight redefinition of racial classifications. [5] A 1946 amendment, like the previous versions, served only to strengthen the provisions of the Act. [1]

The Aborigines' and Torres Strait Islanders' Affairs Act 1965 repealed the 1939 Act, and provided for the management of reserves and welfare for Indigenous persons (both Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people). Under this legislation, protection as a policy was abandoned. The new policy of assimilation began. The Act retained many elements of control of Indigenous people. Under this legislation, the Queensland Department of Aboriginal and Islander Affairs was created. [5]

With the Aborigines Act 1971 and the Torres Strait Islanders Act 1971 , the government stated an intention to improve the development of the reserves, and also the welfare system through its policy of assimilation. But, significant legal restrictions on the movement and activities of the people living on reserves remained. [5]

All of these were very similar in intent and effect to the original 1897 legislation. [1] A court ruling in Mabo v Queensland (No 1) (1988) overturned the Australian policy that had ruled annexation extinguished Indigenous land claims. This ruling was implemented when the Parliament passed legislation – the Aboriginal Land Act 1991 and the Torres Strait Islander Act 1991 – that Indigenous land rights in Queensland were provided for. [5] This issue has been further clarified by the important High Court ruling in Mabo v. Queensland (1992) and the Native Title Act 1993 .

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stolen Generations</span> Indigenous Australian children forcibly acculturated into White Australian society

The Stolen Generations were the children of Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander descent who were removed from their families by the Australian federal and state government agencies and church missions, under acts of their respective parliaments. The removals of those referred to as "half-caste" children were conducted in the period between approximately 1905 and 1967, although in some places mixed-race children were still being taken into the 1970s.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">1967 Australian referendum (Aboriginals)</span> 1967 constitutional referendum on the legal status of Indigenous Australians

The second question of the 1967 Australian referendum of 27 May 1967, called by the Holt government, related to Indigenous Australians. Voters were asked whether to give the Federal Government the power to make special laws for Indigenous Australians in states, and whether in population counts for constitutional purposes to include all Indigenous Australians. The term "the Aboriginal Race" was used in the question.

Aboriginal Protection Board, also known as Aborigines Protection Board, Board for the Protection of Aborigines, Aborigines Welfare Board, and similar names, refers to a number of historical Australian state-run institutions with the function of regulating the lives of Aboriginal Australians. They were also responsible for administering the various half-caste acts where these existed and had a key role in the Stolen Generations. The boards had nearly ultimate control over Aboriginal people's lives.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies</span> Australian research institute for Indigenous studies

The Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies (AIATSIS), established as the Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies (AIAS) in 1964, is an independent Australian Government statutory authority. It is a collecting, publishing and research institute and is considered to be Australia's premier resource for information about the cultures and societies of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. The institute is a leader in ethical research and the handling of culturally sensitive material and holds in its collections many unique and irreplaceable items of cultural, historical and spiritual significance. The collection at AIATSIS has been built through over 50 years of research and engagement with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities and is now a source of language and culture revitalisation, native title research and family and community history. AIATSIS is located on Acton Peninsula in Canberra, Australian Capital Territory.

The role of Protector of Aborigines was first established in South Australia in 1836.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Coranderrk</span> Former Aboriginal reserve, now heritage site, in Victoria, Australia

The Bwgcolman is the self-assigned name for the Aboriginal Australians who were deported from many areas of the Queensland mainland, and confined in resettlement on Great Palm Island after the establishment of an Aboriginal reserve there in 1918, the Palm Island Aboriginal Settlement, and their descendants today. The name has also sometimes been applied to the island itself.

The voting rights of Indigenous Australians became an issue from the mid-19th century, when responsible government was being granted to Britain's Australian colonies, and suffrage qualifications were being debated. The resolution of universal rights progressed into the mid-20th century.

<i>Half-Caste Act</i> 1890s Australian laws removing mixed-race Aboriginal children from their families

Half-Caste Act was the common name given to Acts of Parliament passed in Victoria and Western Australia in 1886. They became the model for legislation to control Aboriginal people throughout Australia - Queensland's Aboriginals Protection and Restriction of the Sale of Opium Act 1897, NSW/ACT's Aboriginal Protection Act 1909, the Northern Territory Aboriginals Act 1910, South Australia's Aborigines Act 1911, and Tasmania's Cape Barren Island Reserve Act 1912.

The Indigenous Collection at the Miles District Historical Village is a collection of Australian Aboriginal artefacts from the local area and western Queensland, some of which are extremely rare, and has national historic significance by its association with Indigenous Australians. The Miles District in south-east Queensland supported the Barunggam people, and was a transition stop for other Aboriginal peoples.

Commonwealth, State, and Territory Parliaments of Australia have passed Aboriginal land rights legislation.

Indigenous land rights in Australia, also known as Aboriginal land rights in Australia, are the rights and interests in land of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in Australia; the term may also include the struggle for those rights. Connection to the land and waters is vital in Australian Aboriginal culture and to that of Torres Strait Islander people, and there has been a long battle to gain legal and moral recognition of ownership of the lands and waters occupied by the many peoples prior to colonisation of Australia starting in 1788, and the annexation of the Torres Strait Islands by the colony of Queensland in the 1870s.

An Aboriginal reserve, also called simply reserve, was a government-sanctioned settlement for Aboriginal Australians, created under various state and federal legislation. Along with missions and other institutions, they were used from the 19th century to the 1960s to keep Aboriginal people separate from the white Australian population, for various reasons perceived by the government of the day. The Aboriginal reserve laws gave governments much power over all aspects of Aboriginal people’s lives.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Deebing Creek Mission</span> Historic site in Queensland, Australia

Deebing Creek Mission is a heritage-listed former Aboriginal reserve at South Deebing Creek Road, Deebing Heights, City of Ipswich, Queensland, Australia. It was built from c. 1887 to c. 1915. It is also known as Deebing Creek Aboriginal Home, Deebing Creek Aboriginal Mission, and Deebing Creek Aboriginal Reserve. It was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 24 September 2004.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Durundur Mission</span>

Durundur Mission was an Aboriginal reserve in Queensland, Australia. It operated from 1877 to 1905 in the area now known as Woodford in the City of Moreton Bay.

The Northern Territory Aboriginals Act 1910 was an Act of the South Australian parliament, assented to on 7 December 1910. The Act established the Northern Territory Aboriginals Department, to be responsible for the control and welfare of Aboriginal people in the Northern Territory, and created the office of Chief Protector of Aborigines. On 1 January 1911, the Northern Territory was transferred from South Australia to federal government control. The 1910 Act was repealed by the federal government's Aboriginals Ordinance 1918 on 13 June 1918, which nevertheless carried forward many of the provisions of the 1910 Act. A 1939 amendment replaced the position of Chief Protector with Director of Native Affairs.

Aboriginal Australian identity, sometimes known as Aboriginality, is the perception of oneself as Aboriginal Australian, or the recognition by others of that identity. Aboriginal Australians are one of two Indigenous Australian groups of peoples, the other being Torres Strait Islanders. There has also been discussion about the use of "Indigenous" vs "Aboriginal", or more specific group names, such as Murri or Noongar (demonyms), Kaurna or Yolngu, based on language, or a clan name. Usually preference of the person(s) in question is used, if known.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Palm Island Aboriginal Settlement</span> Australian Aboriginal reserve (1914–1975) in Queensland

Palm Island Aboriginal Settlement, later officially known as Director of Native Affairs Office, Palm Island and also known as Palm Island Aboriginal Reserve, Palm Island mission and Palm Island Dormitory, was an Aboriginal reserve and penal settlement on Great Palm Island, the main island in the Palm Island group in North Queensland, Australia. It was the largest and most punitive reserve in Queensland.

The Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders Advancement League, (CATSIAL), also referred to as the Cairns Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders Advancement League or Cairns Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Advancement League, and Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders Advancement League (Cairns), was an Indigenous rights organisation founded in Cairns, Queensland in January 1960. It existed until the late 1970s.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 "Aboriginals Protection and Restriction of the Sale of Opium Act 1897 (Qld)". Documenting a Democracy. Museum of Australian Democracy. Retrieved 8 February 2020.
  2. 1 2 Reynolds, H. (30 March 1991). "Appendix 1a the Aboriginals in colonial society, 1840-1897". Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody .
  3. ↑ "Queensland Parliamentary Papers: Report of the Chief Protector of Aboriginals" (PDF). AIATSIS. 1905. p. 13.
  4. ↑ "Queensland Parliamentary Papers: Report of the Chief Protector of Aboriginals" (PDF). AIATSIS. 1920. pp. 1–5.
  5. 1 2 3 4 "Everyone's Parliament: Indigenous Suffrage Timeline Queensland" (PDF). Factsheet 10.5. Parliament of Queensland. Retrieved 8 February 2020.

Further reading

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.