Cooper v Stuart (1889) 14 App Cas 286
File version
Author(s)
de Silva-Wijeyeratne, Roshan
Griffith University Author(s)
Primary Supervisor
Other Supervisors
Editor(s)
Watson, Nicole
Douglas, Heather
Date
Size
File type(s)
Location
License
Abstract
This commentary explains the Privy Council’s opinion in Cooper v Stuart (1889) 14 App Cas 286, a case which continues to influence Australia’s constitutional framework. Despite being overturned by Mabo v Queensland (No 2) (‘Mabo [No 2]’), the case remains important because of the Privy Council’s justification for the application of English common law to the colony of New South Wales. The Privy Council’s explanation, which rested on NSW being a ‘tract of territory practically unoccupied, without settled inhabitants or settled law’, stood as the legal authority for Australian nationhood for over a century. This became known as the ‘enlarged notion of terra nullius’, a process that Brennan J explained in Mabo (No 2) as resulting in the ‘parcel by parcel’ dispossession of First Nations which ‘underwrote the development of the nation’. This explanation also helped prefigure the circumstances in which the Australian state, including the Australian Constitution, developed without legitimate consideration for the rights of First Nations. Rather than rewriting the judgment, the authors provide a commentary on the social history of the case and its impact on Australian constitutionalism. The commentary ends by discussing a Makarrata Commission as proposed by the Uluru Statement from the Heart. As part of an imagined Makarrata Commission, a Research Partnership is established to support future ‘truth-telling’.
Journal Title
Conference Title
Book Title
Indigenous Legal Judgments: Bringing Indigenous Voices into Judicial Decision Making
Edition
1st
Volume
Issue
Thesis Type
Degree Program
School
Publisher link
Patent number
Funder(s)
Grant identifier(s)
Rights Statement
Rights Statement
Item Access Status
Note
Access the data
Related item(s)
Subject
Historical studies
Law and legal studies
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and the law
Persistent link to this record
Citation
Synot, E; de Silva-Wijeyeratne, R, Commentary: Cooper v Stuart (1889) 14 App Cas 286, Indigenous Legal Judgments: Bringing Indigenous Voices into Judicial Decision Making, 2021, 1