COMMONWEALTH OF AUSTRALIA
NORTHERN TERRITORY ADMINISTRATION,
Aboriginal Branch, DARWIN
7th October, 1935
His Honour,
The Administrator of the Northern Territory,
DARWIN.
Probably no phase of Commonwealth policy in the administration of the Northern Territory is beset with so many and so diverse problems and exposed to so much rancorous and conflicting criticism, from individuals and organizations, purporting to be authoritative, as is aboriginal protection.
Possibly this is attributable largely to the operation of two factors:-
- the failure of the Commonwealth to evolve to a definite and progressive policy directed towards the ultimate orientation of the aboriginal within the civilized community.
- the fact that aboriginal protection has never been based upon logical principles but has evolved as a sequence of expedients resorted to by Governments usually under pressure from sometimes one and sometimes another organization interested in Aboriginal Welfare. Such organizations are more or less ill-informed in the problem with which they deal, usually bitterly partisan and commonly pledged to policies widely at variance and utterly repugnant, one to another.
I take the opportunity of the Minister’s visit to the Territory to summarize the problem of the aboriginal as I see it, correlating my own experience with the views advanced by anthropologists, missionaries, pastoralists and industrialists, in an endeavour to indicate its basic factors and to evolve for his consideration a policy, which will at once honour the Commonwealth’s obligation to the aboriginal, and yet so far meet opposition from the more bitter partisans as not to prove impracticable at the outset.
It is suggested that some such policy should be adopted and publicly announced with a view to its gradual development over a period of years.
In his so called normal state the aboriginal lives a life utterly at variance with that under which he must exist in contact with civilization. His habit of life demands a very extensive area out of all proportion to his numbers since he is not given to stock raising, agriculture or husbandry but depends for food upon the natural flora and fauna of the country. Each tribe or clan has its own area of occupation or tribal hunting ground, over which the various individuals and families move as nomads according to the dictates of self-interest or tribal ritual. Upon this area specified localities are sacred and may not be visited by certain people, sometimes under pain of death. All manner of sanctions and taboos apply to individual members of the tribe not only in respect of their relations to one another but also to scared localities and food supplies. Social organization is maintained by the elders to whom the details of tribal ritual and social relationship have been handed down by their ancestors and who will in turn pass this information on, in their declining years, to younger men.
The social organization of the tribe is inextricably associated with the topographical features of the tribal area. The members of the tribe have no fixed place of abode but camp for variable periods at favoured sites near water.
When the white man enters this tribal area and the aboriginal makes contact with the new civilization for the first time, the process of detribalization which follows tends to proceed along a typical course. Young men are displaced from their normal status in the tribe by being placed in employment. In the course of this employment they may be required to visit places in their own country, which under the laws of their own social organization, they must not visit under penalty perhaps of death. On the other hand the appeal of the whiteman’s food and particularly of horsemanship tend to alienate the youth’s sympathy from his elders in favour of the new employment whilst the attractions of the new mode of life may render the elders tolerant of these heresies. Gradually the elders lose control and the young men reach maturity unfamiliar with and uninterested in the details of tribal ritual, knowledge of which dies with the old men. In the course of time those ceremonies and sanctions which held the tribe together are lost and the individual becomes an isolated unit without social background either European or native.
The waters, which have been sites for camping grounds, ritual ceremonies or preferred hunting fields now become a source of supply for the white man. The latter complains bitterly of the aboriginals disturbing his stock by camping on these waters and exerts every effort to induce the natives to give up their migratory habit. One method of achieving this is to encourage the congregation of aboriginals around the head stations by free issues of food and tobacco in return for minor employment. In this way the normal tribal life undergoes a further phase of disruption.
This period of initial contact and subsequent disintegration is viewed from different standpoints by white observers, according to the outlook of the individuals, and methods of solving the problems it involves are numerous and conflicting.
- The anthropologist regards it as the initial stage of the process of detribalization which will be followed by extinction. He urges the Government to avert this danger by proclaiming reserves which shall be inviolate, and prohibited to prospectors, pastoralists and missionaries alike. The obvious objections to these recommendations are :-
(a) that large areas of land, actively sought by graziers, miners and others, are left in idleness in order that the aboriginal may continue to live as a stone age man neither developing the country himself nor permitting it to be developed by others. Idle country in the Northern Territory of Australia is deemed to be a national menace. It is not to be supposed that an aggressor nation from overseas would respect aboriginal reserves in urging that Australia had, by leaving the country undeveloped, failed to justify exclusive retention of it. The National Government must decide whether it is in the interest of the nation or the Aboriginal Race that large areas of land coveted by other nations should be set aside as a museum of sociology.
(b) that it would be necessary to provide a large number of such reserves each of considerable area as each tribe must be accommodated on its own tribal ground if the purpose is to preserve the native social organization. Transfer of a tribe to a new country would defeat its own purpose as the preservation of the social organization demands retention of the old ritual sites.
(c) that the suggestion does not meet the problem of the tribe, whose country has been taken up and amongst whom the process of detribalization has commenced. - The missionary appreciates a truth which the anthropologist appears to overlook. He recognises that, whether temporarily secluded on reserves or not, the aboriginal must ultimately come in contact with white civilization. He believes that the solution of the problem lies in evangelization of the native tribes, prior to their contact with white settlement, and he endeavours to break down, in some measures, tribal organization, substituting for it the Christian religion and a certain amount of elementary education, his purpose being to prepare the native for the inevitable ultimate contact. The defects of this system are :-
(a) Christianity is a religion of purely individual significance. It includes no factor of social integration and does not furnish a social background. It is a religion suitable only to people who are already otherwise provided with a social organization e.g. a legal code. The aboriginal has no religion but he has a definite social organization. Christianity demolishes his social organization and, without replacing it, gives him a religion, the practice of which does not make him a social unit in the white community.
(b) for the most part Missionary organizations are too parsimonious, too incompetent and too narrow in outlook to carry their work beyond the stage where it constitutes a definite menace. Probably of all the Missions in the Territory, Bathurst Island is the only one that can boast of its results but it should be remembered that this Station is concerned with a superior type of native.
- The pastoralist, and, to a smaller extent, the miner recognise that vacant country is a potential source of wealth. If they themselves are provided with a leasehold they, the pastoralist particularly, may favour the seclusion of aboriginals on reserves in order that migratory tribes may not disturb their stock or the aboriginals they employ. On the other hand should they require land they will loudly demand the right to occupy suitable pastoral areas or mineral fields known or believed to exist on aboriginal reserves.
The pastoralist also recognises a truth which the anthropologist overlooks and that is that the normal native life is utterly incompatible with white settlement. In order successfully to manage his property he must actively exploit every factor calculated to disrupt tribal life. The migration of aboriginals through his country disturbs his stock and their camping frightens his cattle from the water holes, impoverishing their condition. He is at pains to secure his labour from the tribe and endeavours to keep the unemployed natives off his run by encouraging them to remain near the head station. For this reason too he opposes any regulation of employment particularly in respect of wages on the ground that the cost of feeding the dependents of his workers exceeds the wage value of their earnings. He submits that if he is required to pay white wages a large number of those at present engaged in the pastoral industry would have to abandon their holdings and, in any event, the aboriginal now detribalized would be left destitute on the hands of the Government.
- The industrialist sees in the employment of the aboriginal a factor of cheap labour, which will exclude the white man from industry. He urges that the aboriginal should be:
(a) segregated in a reserve set apart for the purpose and not permitted to be employed in competition with white labour, or
(b) subject to the same wage and general employment conditions as are prescribed by the Award for unionists.
Either of these alternatives would appear to be impracticable at the moment. As to the first, it would be inhumane to uproot most Myall or partly civilized tribes from their native soil, particularly as the only reserves to which they could be transferred are already occupied by other tribes and conflict would indubitably follow this new immigration. As to the second, the aboriginal has not yet reached the stage of civilization where he could justify such a wage in competition with the white man in the open labour market. A great majority of aboriginals would be thrown out of employment, they would be unable to return to their former mode of life and they would still remain the responsibility of Government.
This very involved problem of the ethics of the employment of aboriginals on cattle stations was discussed by me in my memorandum of 10th March, 1928, and I think it would be opportune to quote from the remarks then made :-
“Most of the objections real and imaginary raised against the present system of employment of natives have their origin in a misconception of relative values. Their proponents are for the most part oblivious to the fact that the Aboriginal’s living standard is not comparable to that of the White. The Aboriginal, to live the life that has been his ancestors’ from time immemorial, requires neither wage nor dole. The virgin bush is at once his dwelling, his wardrobe, and his well stocked larder. The White man, on the other hand, being a unit of an elaborate artificial social structure, in unable to live at the standard set by usage unless permanently employed at a comparatively high wage. The minimum wage is arbitrarily fixed for him by a judicial statistical computation of the cost of maintaining a home, a wife and family. The basic fact emerges that for comparative purposes the zero point on the scale of economic equality is represented when the Black man is free to do an earn nothing, and the White is constantly employed at the minimum basic wage. Should the Aboriginal, brought into contact with a higher civilization, desire for a season to adopt the White man’s diet standard, he may offer his services to a White employer. Broadly speaking the economic basis of Aboriginal employment may be thus summarised. The Aboriginal asks for flour, sugar, tea, meat, tobacco and clothing, and the White man affords him an opportunity of earning these. The Aboriginal is free to remain or leave as the whim takes him and his voluntary return to his old bush life may be for a lengthy period. The objections may be urged against this system – an industrial and an ethical.
The industrialist attacks the opportunity thus afforded for an employer to engage Aboriginals for little more than the cost of maintenance, to do work which would otherwise be performed by highly paid white labour, thus reducing the avenues of employment open to white men. This objection, when all is told, is the real basis of all assertions that the Aboriginal is oppressed and exploited. Were the declamation against exploitation genuine more would be heard of the indenture system under which Koepangers are signed on to Pearling vessels. The objection is both socially and economically unsound. The Aboriginal, if he does not consider the remuneration received commensurate with his loss of freedom, is at liberty to avoid work if he feels so disposed. For him, unemployment has no terrors. If he works he does so from choice and there can be no question of oppression or exploitation. On the other hand the employer of Aboriginal labour could not possibly maintain at current rates of wages, a white staff to do the work at present performed by Aboriginals. The pastoral industry for example, which is the only industry of note in the Territory, would collapse without cheap labour, and the few whites at present in contact employment would find themselves adrift on a raft of principle. Labour creates labour and the industrial objection to the employment of the Aboriginal cannot be sustained.
The ethical objection is based on the claim that if the Aboriginal’s living standard is at present below that of a White, this disparity should not be perpetuated, and a genuine opportunity should be afforded him of bringing himself up to the higher level. This, it may be urged, can only be accomplished by insisting that the Aboriginal, when brought into contact with White civilization shall work and live at the basic white standard. Unfortunately this laudable ideal would be ill served by any direct and abrupt method of transition. The economic and racial factors involved require that the process of assimilating the Aboriginal into the white population shall be gradual and evolutionary.
There are, for instance, very serious objections to the payment of Aboriginals in cash, notwithstanding that the Ordinance requires this. Even the more civilized are unappreciated of its purchasing value and are therefore exposed to fraud. Even when dealing with honest salesmen the Aboriginal dissipates his money on the purchase of useless articles and gauds. In Town districts the Aboriginal in possession of money falls a ready prey to the gambling, drinking and opium smoking habits. Furthermore once cognisant of its value in relation to these vices he is quick when penniless to exploit the monetary possibilities of his lubras. Less frequently he learns to thieve. In my opinion cash payment of Aboriginals is the greatest single factor in the degradation of the native brought into contact with white civilization.
On the other hand it is essential for his well being in a civilized community that the Aboriginal be employed. Employed, he is able to improve his living standard; out of employment, he is exposed to the temptations to prostitution and theft in order to obtain the necessaries of life, for by the very circumstances of the advance of civilization he has been deprived of the opportunity to lead his own life. He must therefore become, unless admitted to the white community, either an undesirable or a permanent charge upon the public purse. It must not be forgotten however that the justification for the employment of Aboriginal labour at a low remuneration is contingent upon the absence of duress. By duress is meant no so much the whip and bondage of the slave driver which Protectors can readily recognise and prevent, but the insidious effects of advancing civilization which are more likely to be overlooked. The extension of white influence in a given area may to some extent impair the facilities for Bush Life, which may in consequence become less attractive or more hazardous thus creating a factor influencing the Aboriginal to remain in employment under circumstances distasteful to him. On Cattle Stations too, the management, with a view to preventing the disturbance of cattle watering on certain holes or grazing on certain pastures, may harass Aboriginals camping there in an endeavour to confine migration o a restricted and perhaps ill chosen area. Bush life must by these means be rendered less attractive and more arduous and Aboriginals affected must be acknowledged to be under the same degree of pressure towards permanent employment.”
With this in view it has been the Commonwealth’s policy to prescribe a wage to be paid aboriginals employed in country districts, all or part of the total amount of a native’s earnings being waived by the Chief Protector where is satisfied that the employer has disbursed a similar sum in the maintenance of his fellow tribesmen. To this extent the Commonwealth is associated with the pastoralist in active disruption of tribal organization.
With each successive change of Government or Minister the various protagonists renew their advocacy each of his own specific remedy. As one view or another is favoured by the Government of the day so general aboriginal policy is varied to the embarrassment of executive officers and with the result that such little advance as is made is effected in a series of inco-ordinate spasmodic forward movements checked and offset by detours and retrogressions so that the progress of aboriginal protection in the Territory resembles nothing so much as the course of a man in an advanced stage of loco-motor ataxia.
It is recommended, therefore, as a matter of urgency that the Commonwealth define and adhere to a progressive policy to be followed and developed over a series of years and as a basis for discussion, I submit the following suggestions that appear to meet the problem as I see it :-
It must be recognised at the outset that there is an outstanding difference between inter-racial relationships in this country and in other countries where white settlement intrudes upon a native population. In most such countries, European immigrants are relatively few and if they are concerned with the Government of a native people, who are in a very considerable majority, policies are determined by the welfare of the natives and are framed in conformance with existing native social organization. In this country, on the other hand, general policy must be regulated in the interests of the white intruder and is followed regardless of its destructive effect upon the native social organization with which it is incompatible.
As the survival of native social organization is incompatible with the policy of white settlement to which the Commonwealth is committed and as it is impossible for the aboriginal to survive without some social organization, the obvious need is to provide him with one which is compatible with the expansion of white settlement. Only in this way can degeneration of the native tribe into a large number of pariah units be averted. This development must be largely a process of evolution but it should certainly be begun immediately in those localities where factors of social integration have already been lost.
It is recommended that the Commonwealth commit itself to a policy of adsorbing the aboriginal race to the civilized community. This policy requires development over a period of many years but it should have as its ultimate purpose the provision to the aboriginal of a definite social status comparable to that of the white citizen. It is suggested that the problem be attacked along the following lines : –
- Amongst detribalized aboriginals, e.g. those in the vicinity of Darwin and other towns, the essential feature of detribalization is as already stated, that the aboriginal has no social background either European or native. Socially and economically it is in the best interests of the white race that the native should have some status in society. That with which his tribal organization provided him has been lost and cannot be recovered. It remains, therefore, to substitute one which orientates him in the European settlement. The aboriginal should be educated as an effective economic unit in the Territory population instead of continuing as a social incubus. Following this general education, he should be trained in various avenues of employment, security in which is guaranteed him by statute but which would not impair the opportunities of employment available to the white. Such avenues are, I suggest :-
a) Domestic employment
b) Employment as cooks for private families
c) Employment as motor drivers by private persons
d) All phases of the pearling industry in replacement of indentured labour
e) Regimentation as Native Police
f) Public and private gardening
g) Forestry
For this purpose Government should set aside in selected centres commencing with Darwin, a residential area exclusively for the aboriginal race. Here specially designed hygienic barracks and dwellings should be erected for their occupation and in association with these schools, recreation facilities, an adequate water supply, and efficient sanitary system and scope for horticulture should be provided.
The aboriginal child should be educated to a standard comparable to that required by the State for white children at leaving age, 14, particular attention being devoted to:
(a) equipping the native to take his place in the white community with a proper realization of his obligations to it, a knowledge of the significance of time and the value of money, neither of which realized by him at present.
(b) teaching the native to recognise the significance of contract. One of the principal difficulties in the employment of aboriginals at present is the irresponsibility of native labour. It is not unusual for an aboriginal to undertake employment for a specified period and terminate his engagement at short notice thereby causing considerable inconvenience and financial loss to his employer and discrediting native labour generally.
(c) inculcating a high appreciation of the principles of hygiene and personal cleanliness.
(d) Eradicating the nomadic background and developing the community sense centred upon the provision of a home for the individual and his family and the exploitation of the soil and domestic animals as a source of food supply.
From this stage each youth may be drafted into employment as opportunity offers. It is suggested for instance, that the Darwin Botanic Gardens, perennially short of labour, could, with advantage, be utilized for the training of gardeners.
- Amongst aboriginal tribes, who have not so far reached the stage of detribalization existing in Darwin, for instance, those in the vicinity of pastoral leases, provision should be made for a large number of small reserves where all the remnants of the tribe may continue as far as possible to live according to their own customs and to which native employees may repair during seasons of unemployment. The boundaries of such reserves should include as far as possible the principal ceremonial centres and should therefore, be determined by careful anthropological survey. Gradually the aboriginals on these reserves should be induced to abandon the nomadic habit and live in settlements. In this way it would become possible for them to make good the deficiencies of native food supply, which at present constitute such a grave factor of disintegration, by undertaking horticulture and maintaining herds of goats and cattle. In the course of time the natives on these reserves should be brought under the influence of the education system already established in more advanced centres.
- In respect of the Myall aboriginal at present beyond the sphere of civilized control, it is recommended that the areas which they occupy should, for the present, continue as inviolable reserves. The Minister, may, however deem it desirable to permit Missions to commence or continue here the adaptation of the aboriginal to contact with white civilization before he is exposed to it in the ordinary course of the country’s progress. It should, however, be insisted that Missions submit to very much greater control than is the case at present. The Board of Enquiry into the management of the Roper River Mission recommended that all Missions should be licensed by the Minister, the granting of such a licence being conditional upon the Mission complying with the following conditions, viz. that they agree :
(a) to lodge with the Administrator a detailed statement of policy and subsequently annual reports of progress
(b) to advise the Administrator of changes in personnel furnishing the proposed date of commencement of new appointees and outlining their qualifications.
(c) to furnish the Chief Medical Officer with a block plan of the Mission premises and a detailed plan of each building used for human habitation and in regards to a new Mission, obtaining approval of the site to be built upon before commencing erection.
(d) to submit plans and specifications of all proposed new buildings to the Chief Medical Officer for approval and if necessary modification, construction subsequently to comply with the plans and specifications approved by the Chief Medical Officer.
(e) to comply with instructions to be issued by the Chief Medical Officer in respect of measures to be taken to ensure:
- the continuous maintenance of the Mission in a satisfactory state of sanitation
- the provision for aboriginals of a diet which does not fall below a prescribed minimum
- the proper housing and accommodation of aboriginals on the Mission
- the proper notification and the adequate prophylaxis and treatment of disease
- the proper control of clothing issues and the education of aboriginal in personal hygiene
- to furnish to the Chief Protector a quarterly report on education of aboriginal and half-caste children.
It is recommended that to these be added the requirement that the education of aboriginals on Mission Stations shall be under the direct control of the Supervisor of Education who would prepare a curriculum, approved by the Chief Protector of Aboriginals, to which Mission teachers must adhere.
The following considerations must be borne in mind in connection with Mission activity:-
(a) ceremonial is perhaps the most important factor of social integration. Missions must be required to maintain the existing social organization of the tribes until they are in a position to substitute for it a new system which is as effective. One of the great difficulties attending the christianization of the aboriginal tribe as distinct from other natives races, is the absence of chieftain authority. In many parts of the world it has been possible to christianize a people en masse simply by gaining the goodwill and co-operation of the chieftain. In such cases, christianization is effected without disturbing the social organization. There being no such chieftain authority amongst the aboriginals the social organization is founded upon integrating factors which are destroyed by Christianity. The intrusion of a Mission spells ultimate destruction of social organization. If it be admitted that this ultimate destruction is inevitable and necessary and that the function of the Mission is to protect the native during this evolutionary period and to pass him through it into the civilized community securely equipped to withstand the impact of his new environment, the activities of Missions may be permitted to continue but the methods employed must be rigorously controlled. To this end licences should be issued to Missions by the Minister only on condition that they make a full statement of policy and agree to conform in method to conditions from time to time required by the Chief Protector.
(b) the Mission youths under conditions at present existing tend to suffer from superiority complex when associating with other natives who have not had a Mission training. This largely accounts for the often quoted instances of the failure of Missions to evolve a successful type of educated aboriginal. This difficulty would largely be overcome by making the education of the aboriginal more general and controlling more effectively the association of the educated with the uneducated.
These proposals are made as a basis for discussion and for the general consideration of the Minister. Should the outline of policy meet with his approval a detailed plan can be prepared.
Cecil Cook
Chief Protector of Aboriginals