May 27, 1967 / Oceania
Australia's Referendum and the Constitutional Status of Indigenous Peoples
A long rights movement helped bring about a constitutional referendum that removed the exclusion of Indigenous people from population counts and expanded federal legislative powers concerning Indigenous affairs.
The story
On May 27, 1967, Australian voters overwhelmingly supported constitutional amendments removing the provision that excluded Indigenous people from population counts and removing the exception for Indigenous people in the states from the federal power to make laws concerning race. The amendments formally came into effect in August that year. The referendum did not grant Indigenous people citizenship or the federal vote for the first time that day; federal voting rights were reformed in 1962. These legal changes should be understood separately. The federal capital, Canberra, represents the nationwide referendum on the map, while demands concerning land, equality, and self-government continued.
Elsewhere in the world
This can be compared with the U.S. Civil Rights Act of 1964 and New Zealand's Waitangi Tribunal of 1975 to examine how different countries responded to long-standing discrimination and colonial legacies.
Dates and precision
May 27, 1967 Documented date
Positioned by the documented year, month or day; missing months and days are not inferred.
Representative map location
Representative coordinates · -35.2809°, 149.13°
Coordinates locate a representative point for the story. They do not mean the event happened only here and do not represent historical borders.
Bibliography
- National Museum of Australia | Indigenous Referendum
- Australian Parliamentary Library | Federal Voting Rights Reform and Common Misconceptions about the 1967 Referendum
Sources are listed as bibliography titles, without external links. A reference does not mean every sentence or interpretation has been independently verified.