Treaties with Aborigines in Australia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batman's_Treaty

John Batman's 1836 Treaty with the Wurundjeri near Melbourne was the only instance of a written land agreement between white settlers & indigenous Australians- which was later nullified by the Crown. However, WI the treaty hadn't been so dismissed ? WI there'd been other attempts made by other white settlers to come to some mutual understanding of land use & ownership in Australia ? Could there have ever eventuated an Australian version of the Treaty of Waitangi, & with what effects of Aboriginal land rights & race relations in Australia today ?
 
Well the Treaty of Waitangi spent long periods of time being ignored by the NZ Government and the settler majority - pretty much from the period of the Land Wars right up until the late 1960s. It's current prominance in NZ/government is after decades of political action and then later legislative recognition by various governments. So it isn't really much of an example to colonial Australia on that basis.

I think you'd be better suited to trying to get a POD where a State government (for whatever reason) decides to copy the NZ move to give fixed Maori representation in the colonial parliament. That in my opinion was a more concrete recognition of indigenous rights in colonial times than the long ignored Treaty. Probably ASB though

I've pasted below one of the key dates re paragraph one

1877 Treaty of Waitangi judged to be a 'legal nullity'

Chief Justice James Prendergast, in the Wi Parata v Bishop of Wellington case, described the Treaty of Waitangi as 'worthless' because it was signed 'between a civilised nation and a group of savages'. This extreme view held that the Treaty had no judicial or constitutional role in government because Maori were not a nation capable of signing a treaty. Since the Treaty had not been incorporated into domestic law, it was a 'legal nullity'. The Privy Council overturned many of Prendergast's conclusions by the beginning of the 20th century.
 
Last edited:
The treaty of Waitangi was signed as a result of a grinding war with the Maori, so I'd suggest a guerilla war in Australia could do the trick. Lack of population and unity of tribal identity means that such a war will be a problem.
 
I'm not sure a war would make a difference though, for two reasons, firstly the Treaty of Waitangi was signed well before the Land Wars started, by about 20 or so years and secondly that the Treaty of Waitangi was largely ignored very quickly after the Land Wars finished. It provided very little help to Maori until well after WW2.

Anyway, there was apparently sustained fighting for many decades between settlers/Imperial forces and Aborigine groups in the 19th century, it just isn't as well known as the NZ Land Wars seem to be. Perhaps this is because they were at least initially full of seiges and large battles, which tend to capture the imagination of people I guess
 
Top