Abstract
IT is evident that public opinion in Australia has been stirred by recent decisions of the courts in criminal cases in which aborigines have been implicated. Two aborigines undergoing sentence for killing a goat have been released from Port Augusta gaol, according to an Adelaide cable in The Times of May 7, by the Governor of South Australia, Major-General Sir William Dugan, in response to a petition from the Aborigines Friends Association. It was stated that the crime was committed under stress of great hunger and in ignorance of the white man's laws. This decision has renewed interest in the case of the two aborigines recently condemned to ten years imprisonment for killing a fellow-tribesman who had revealed ritual secrets. No doubt an effort will be made to secure some modification of the decision in this case also. These, unfortunately, are not the only cases affecting aborigines which have attained notoriety and caused misgiving as to the judicial procedure in dealing with crimes and misdemeanours of aborigines. They point to the need of a special tribunal and a penal code ad hoc, which will take fully into account aboriginal culture and outlook on life, property and society. It is surely anomalous that while the Federal Government, for example, fosters continued tribal existence by securing to the aborigines the rights of access to traditional hunting grounds and water-holes, it forces them to abrogate tribal custom by submission to a code and tribunal appropriate to the civilisation and outlook of the white man.
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Aborigines and the Law in Australia. Nature 135, 836 (1935). https://doi.org/10.1038/135836a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/135836a0