Australia (Act) day
An annual post
As usual, 26 January has been marked by protests, denunciations of those protests, and further iterations. Even apart from the fact that it marks an invasion, the foundation of a colony that later became one of Australia’s states isn’t much of a basis for a national day.
A logical choice would be the day our Federation came into force, as in Canada. Unfortunately for this idea, our Founders chose 1 Jan 1901. The first day of the 20th century[1] must have seemed like an auspicious choice for a new country, but it was problematic for the anniversary as a national day (though I believe some countries use it in this way).
The ideal thing would be to fix the problems of our current system with a republican constitution including a treaty with the original owners of our land. That would provide a date really worthy of celebration.
In the meantime, I suggest 3 March, the anniversary of the day in 1986 when the Australia Act came into force, finally establishing beyond any doubt that Australia is an independent country, entirely separate from the UK[2]. We had by 1986 a constitution and public policy that was at least formally non-racist, thanks to the 1967 referendum and the end of the White Australia policy. Many of the symbolic problems with the current date would be avoided, though the real injustices would remain to be addressed.
It’s true that the Australia Act doesn’t have a lot of resonance. But any date with a lot of resonance is bound to resonate badly for a large proportion of the population. At least this would be a choice nearly all of us could celebrate without worrying too much about its precise significance
Somebody with more talent than me could do a combination of these two flags.
fn1. At least if you start the count from 1CE. I think it would be more sensible to cross-label 1BCE as 0 CE, making 1900 the start of C20.
fn2. Whether, when and to what extent, we had become an independent country before 1986 remains a mystery, but there’s no doubt after that.
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There are some images of Australian flags here. Some combine our traditional flag and the Aboriginal flag but I read that:
"Harold Thomas, who designed the Aboriginal flag in 1971, is opposed to the expropriation of his flag in this manner by Australians generally, as he would prefer for the Aboriginal flag to exclusively represent indigenous people."
https://www.flagsaustralia.com.au/designsnewflag.html
It would be a good thing if watching the SBS series, The Australian Wars was something all Australians did. Seems good to me but who knows what Sussan Ley thinks about it.
https://www.sbs.com.au/ondemand/tv-series/the-australian-wars
Sorry to be pedantic, but I don’t think it’s accurate to say the Constitution is “formally non-racist”. It’s good the previous exclusion of “the aboriginal race” from the race power was removed - even though ironically the High Court has since ruled that this now empowers the federal government to make laws to the determent of Aboriginal people (such as the NT Intervention) - and from being counted in the census.
But Section 51 still states that the Commonwealth has the power to make laws with respect to “The people of any race for whom it is deemed necessary to make special laws”. It is not implausible to see this used negatively at some time in the future, especially if Australia follows a Trumpian Dutton path.