Anniversaries of the 67 Referendum

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‘The ten year FCAATSI campaign should never be erased but highlighted in our history.’ Burnum Burnum in Attwood & Markus ¹

The 1967 Referendum has become a key event in the history of Indigenous affairs in Australia. Anniversaries of the 1967 Referendum are often a time when progress in achieving social justice is assessed, and the extraordinary courage, energy and work of the campaigners for change are remembered and celebrated. The overwhelming public support of the time is seen as a high point in race relations.

25 years on
One of the most important decisions Australia’s history was handed down on 3 June 1992. This was the High Court judgement in the ‘Mabo Case’ on native title. The finding that native title existed on the Murray Islands in the Torres Strait reverberated around the country and had major implications for Indigenous policy at all levels of government, and continues to be a dominant issue in Indigenous affairs, and from time to time in the public arena. The following year, after extensive negotiations with State governments, farmers, pastoralists, miners and Indigenous leaders, the Native Title Act 1993 was passed. This is one major example of the Federal Government passing special legislation for Indigenous peoples which would not have been possible prior to 1967. The argument of whether this legislation was for the benefit or the detriment of Indigenous peoples entered the public debate. The 1998 amendments to the Act, however, were extensively criticised, and the Commonwealth government was seen to be legislating against Indigenous Australians.

ATSIC, which had been operation for two years, produced a booklet entitled ’25 years on’ which reviewed policy changes since the 1967 Referendum. Lois O’Donogue (as Lowitja O'Donoghue was then known) addressed the National Press Club on 20 May that year on the theme of ’25 years on – one nation, promise or paradox’ and in that speech said:

"There remains a great divide between Indigenous Australians and other Australians. This is not just a matter of statistics. Nor is it a matter of Indigenous culture versus imported culture. In many Aboriginal communities, Aboriginal culture is also an underclass culture, a culture of deprivation: it is a product of what has happened to us over the last 204 years. It is this culture that was starkly illustrated by the Deaths in Custody report.
This year, in part because of the Royal Commission, we appear to be reaching a high-water mark in Commonwealth funding of Aboriginal affairs, and funding committed to grapple with some of the more difficult and intangible problems in indigenous Australia.
I can only hope that this commitment will be long-term, as it must be, and not just a case of modern Australia and by extension the now triumphant liberal democratic world having reached such a pitch of civilisation that it can afford, momentarily, to indulge a comparatively powerless minority, and its own conscience." ²

_{(1) Attwood, Bain and Markus, Andrew, The 1967 Referendum: Race, Power and the Australian Constitution, Canberra, Aboriginal Studies Press, 2007, p. 159
(2) Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission, 25 Years On, Canberra, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission, 1992 Link}

Further reading:
Attwood, Bain and Markus, Andrew, The 1967 Referendum: Race, Power and the Australian Constitution, Canberra, Aboriginal Studies Press, 2007