Migration 10

[I stress my support for] preventing the introduction of aliens to destroy the purity of the Australian people.

Andrew Fisher (1910): Election Speeches. Australian Labour Party.

Andrew Fisher (1862-1928) was Australian Prime Minister from 1908-1909.

Australia is also settler colony. Around 1788 the first British ship landed in Australia, which at that time was inhabited exclusively by Aboriginal peoples. The conquest and land grab of Australia proceeded rapidly. Local white Australians aspired to independence, which led to the founding of the Australian Confederation in 1901. This statement makes it clear how quickly distortion can occur: white Australians had only recently and violently migrated to the country, and shortly thereafter had developed xenophobic attitudes towards other migrants. They imagined the country’s "white purity" being threatened by foreigners and tried to legislate it into being through the aggressive "White Australia Policy".

*Philip Gavin Griffiths (2006): The Making of White Australia: Ruling Class Agendas, 1876-1888. Doctoral Thesis. The Australian National University.

1910