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Jan 1, 1000
Conception of Terra Nullius
Terra Nullius is the Latin expression coming from roman law it means "nobody's land" it is used in international law to describe land that has not been claimed by a state or any previous state as shown any way of occupying that land -
Declaration of Terra Nullius in Australia
in 1770 Terra Nullius was declared by Lt James Cook in 1770 as he was under orders from King George III as Britain needed to establish a penal colony and need land mostly natives were reasoned or bargained with for their land but instead the aboriginal population was seen as savages and placed under the flora and fauna category therefore did not occupy the land -
R v Tommy
The R v Tommy case indicated that the native inhabitants were only subject to English law where the incident concerned both natives and settlers and was the first test of Terra Nullius in Australia The rationale was that Aboriginal tribes already operated under their own laws -
R v Ballard
The legal status of the indigenous people was under fire again in the 1829 case of R v Ballard. Ballard was an aboriginal man accused of murdering another aboriginal the NSW attorney general asked the judges to decide if Ballard came under their jurisdiction as the matter did not concern Europeans the answer was a unanimous no and the trial did not proceed -
Batman's Treaty
Batman's Treaty was an agreement between John Batman, an Australian businessman and explorer, and a group of Wurundjeri elders, for the purchase of land around Port Phillip Batman's Treaty and is considered significant as it was the first and only known time when Europeans negotiated their occupation of Aboriginal lands -
Nullification of Batman's Treaty
The treaty that allowed the Wurundjeri to have some of their land back was declared Null and Void by Governor of NSW Richard Bourke -
R v Murrell and Bummaree
Jack Congo Murrell which was about the accused killing of one aboriginal man by another Murrell's lawyer argued that as he was aboriginal and the matter did not concern settlers so that it was out of the courts jurisdiction but the chief of justice rejected the argument on the grounds that British law applied to everyone in the state of NSW even Aboriginals and was punished under British law -
Cooper V Stuart
The case, Cooper v Stuart , had nothing to do with the rights of Aboriginal people in New South Wales. The Governor of the colony, before 1824, had made a land grant that was subject to a reservation that the government could reacquire at any time. The landowner argued that this reservation was invalid because it was against a long-standing principle of property law known as 'the rule against perpetuities'. The Privy Council eventually held that the reservation was valid -
Milirrpum v Nabalco Pty Ltd
More widely known as the Gove land rights case, Justice Richard Blackburn ruled that Australia had been considered "desert and uncultivated" and therefore, by the law that applied at the time, open to be claimed by right of occupancy, and that there was no such thing as native title in Australian law. The concept of terra nullius was not considered in this case, however -
Mabo v Queensland
Eddie Mabo and four other Torres Strait Islanders from Mer (Murray Island) started a legal battle to establish their traditional land ownership. This led to Mabo v Queensland In 1992, after ten years of hearings before the Queensland Supreme Court and the High Court of Australia found that the Mer people had owned their land prior to annexation by Queensland The ruling thus had far-reaching significance for the land claims of both Torres Strait Islanders and other Indigenous Australians.