Nationality and Citizenship Act 1948

Repealed 15 March 2007 when Australian Citizenship (Transitionals and Consequentials) Act 2007 receives assent

The Nationality and Citizenship Act 1948 (Cth) (the Act) determined the rules for who was and who was not a citizen of Australia, and how citizenship could be gained.

The Act deemed a person born in Australia to be an Australian citizen, and by virtue of that also a British subject.

Effect of the Act

The Act is an example of how the legal rights and the lived realities of citizenship can be very different.

The precursor to the Act (the Nationality Act 1920 (Cth)) had provided a mechanism for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people to apply to become British subjects, whether or not they were denied citizenship under colony or State law (Jordens 1999, p. 26). Furthermore, all Indigenous Australians born after January 1, 1921, gained the legal status of British subjects.

The 1948 Act then provided citizenship automatically by virtue of being born in Australia (section 10).

It was not until the 1967 Referendum, however, which allowed for the enactment of more formal legal rights for Indigenous people that citizenship became more attainable in practice (Brennan 2013; Chesterman & Galligan 1997, p. 119).

Even so, there is still considerable debate about Australian citizenship due to the unequal access to the rights which make up a "full" experience of citizenship. This is because of unequal access to the rights that citizenship grants (Mercer 2003, p. 426), and because of the unique identity of Aboriginality being unrelated to citizenship, as seen in the decision in Love v Commonwealth of Australia; Thoms v Commonwealth of Australia [2020] HCA 3.

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References

Glossary