Aboriginal Title

Delgamuukw. Mabo. Ngati Apa. Recent cases have created a framework for litigating Aboriginal title in Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. The distinguished group of scholars whose work is showcased here, however, shows that our understanding of where the concept of Aboriginal title came from – and where it may be going – can also be enhanced by exploring legal developments in these former British colonies in a comparative, multidisciplinary framework. This path-breaking book offers a perspective on Aboriginal title that extends beyond national borders to consider similar developments in common law countries.

A judicial revolution occurred in 1992 when Australia's highest court discarded a doctrine that had stood for two hundred years, that the country was a terra nullius - a land of no one - when the white man arrived. The proceedings were known as the Mabo Case, named for Eddie Koiki Mabo, the Torres Strait Islander who fought the notion that the Australian Aboriginal people did not have a system of land ownership before European colonization. The case had international repercussions, especially on the four countries in which English-settlers are the dominant population: Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United States. In Recognizing Aboriginal Title, Peter H. Russell offers a comprehensive study of the Mabo case, its background, and its consequences, contextualizing it within the international struggle of Indigenous peoples to overcome their colonized status. Russell weaves together an historical narrative of Mabo's life with an account of the legal and ideological premises of European imperialism and their eventual challenge by the global forces of decolonization. He traces the development of Australian law and policy in relation to Aborigines, and provides a detailed examination of the decade of litigation that led to the Mabo case. Mabo died at the age of fifty-six just five months before the case was settled. Although he had been exiled from his land over a dispute when he was a teenager, he was buried there as a hero. Recognizing Aboriginal Title is a work of enormous importance by a legal and constitutional scholar of international renown, written with a passion worthy of its subject - a man who fought hard for his people and won.

In 1888, the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council ruled in the St. Catherine’s case. This precedent-setting decision would define the legal contours of Aboriginal title in Canada for almost a hundred years. In Flawed Precedent, preeminent legal scholar Kent McNeil examines the trial and its context in detail, demonstrating how erroneous assumptions and prejudicial attitudes about Indigenous peoples and their land use influenced the case. He also discusses the effects the decision had on law and policy until the 1970s when its authority was finally questioned in Calder and in other key rulings. McNeil has written a compelling account of a landmark case that undermined Indigenous land rights for almost a century.

In 1973 the Supreme Court of Canada issued a landmark decision in the Calder case, confirming that Aboriginal title constituted a right within Canadian law. Let Right Be Done examines the doctrine of Aboriginal title thirty years later and puts the Calder case in its legal, historical, and political context, both nationally and internationally. With its innovative blend of scholarly analysis and input from many of those intimately involved in the case, this book should be essential reading for anyone interested in Aboriginal law, treaty negotiations, and the history of the "BC Indian land question."

In this book, Peter H. Russell offers a comprehensive study of the Mabo case, its background, and its consequences, contextualizing it within the international struggle of indigenous peoples to overcome colonized status. --book jacket.

Examines effects of colonisation on title to land in territories settled by the English; outlines possession and title to land in English law, the Crowns title to land in England; describes methods of acquisition of territorial sovereignty; discusses common law Aboriginal title (native title) and its application in United States , Canada and Australia; mentions Milirrpum v. Nabalco Pty Ltd.

Explores the principal ways in which North American and Commonwealth courts have traditionally approached the question of aboriginal land rights.

A judicial revolution occurred in 1992 when Australia's highest court discarded a doctrine that had stood for two hundred years, that the country was a terra nullius – a land of no one – when the white man arrived. The proceedings were known as the Mabo Case, named for Eddie Koiki Mabo, the Torres Strait Islander who fought the notion that the Australian Aboriginal people did not have a system of land ownership before European colonization. The case had international repercussions, especially on the four countries in which English-settlers are the dominant population: Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United States. In Recognizing Aboriginal Title, Peter H. Russell offers a comprehensive study of the Mabo case, its background, and its consequences, contextualizing it within the international struggle of Indigenous peoples to overcome their colonized status. Russell weaves together an historical narrative of Mabo's life with an account of the legal and ideological premises of European imperialism and their eventual challenge by the global forces of decolonization. He traces the development of Australian law and policy in relation to Aborigines, and provides a detailed examination of the decade of litigation that led to the Mabo case. Mabo died at the age of fifty-six just five months before the case was settled. Although he had been exiled from his land over a dispute when he was a teenager, he was buried there as a hero. Recognizing Aboriginal Title is a work of enormous importance by a legal and constitutional scholar of international renown, written with a passion worthy of its subject – a man who fought hard for his people and won.