The Racial Discrimination Act 1975 (RDA) is a statute passed by the Australian Parliament during the Prime Ministership of Labor Gough Whitlam.
The RDA makes racial discrimination unlawful in Australia and overrides inconsistent States and Territory legislation, making the State or Territory law ineffective to the extent of the inconsistency. The power of the national Parliament to pass this over-riding law arises under the "external affairs" power contained in section 51(xxix) of the Australian Constitution. The power arose from the International Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Racial Discrimination to which Australia is a signatory. This use of the power in this manner was confirmed in the landmark High Court decision in Koowarta v. Bjelke-Petersen in 1982.
Read more about Racial Discrimination Act 1975: Definition of Racial Discrimination Under The Act, Racial Hatred Act, Australian Human Rights Commission, Northern Territory National Emergency Response in Relation To The RDA
Famous quotes containing the words racial discrimination, racial and/or act:
“I say to you quite frankly that the time for racial discrimination is over.”
—Jimmy Carter (James Earl Carter, Jr.)
“Please stop using the word “Negro.”... We are the only human beings in the world with fifty-seven variety of complexions who are classed together as a single racial unit. Therefore, we are really truly colored people, and that is the only name in the English language which accurately describes us.”
—Mary Church Terrell (1863–1954)
“We must not suppose that, because a man is a rational animal, he will, therefore, always act rationally; or, because he has such or such a predominant passion, that he will act invariably and consequentially in pursuit of it. No, we are complicated machines; and though we have one main spring that gives motion to the whole, we have an infinity of little wheels, which, in their turns, retard, precipitate, and sometime stop that motion.”
—Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl Chesterfield (1694–1773)