Early Political Mobilisation & The 1928 Native Union

1. Genesis of First Nations Political Mobilization in Western Australia

In the aftermath of the First World War, as surviving First Nations soldiers returned home to face the continuing humiliation of the Aborigines Act 1905, a powerful movement of early political mobilization emerged across Western Australia.¹ Rejecting settler paternalism and missionary charity, Bibbullmun leaders began establishing autonomous political bodies, demanding full citizenship, the abolition of the pass system, and the restoration of stolen clan estates.² This organising laid the institutional foundation for modern Indigenous rights movements in Australia.³

2. William Bodney, John Kickett, and the 1928 Native Union

Among the foremost pioneers of early mobilization were William Bodney of the Swan Valley and John Kickett of the Avon Valley.⁴ Bodney, a proud Whadjuk lawman, campaigned tirelessly against police roundups and urban curfews in Perth.⁵ In 1928, Bodney, Kickett, and fellow activists formed the Native Union—one of the earliest independent Aboriginal political associations in Western Australia.⁶ The Native Union held meetings in fringe camps, collected dues, and submitted formal petitions to the Western Australian Parliament, demanding the repeal of Section 8 of the 1905 Act and the right of Aboriginal parents to educate their own children.⁷

3. Cross-State Solidarity and The Australian Aborigines League Links

The Western Australian movement did not operate in isolation.⁸ Leaders of the Native Union established active correspondence networks with prominent eastern states activists, including William Cooper of the Australian Aborigines League (AAL) in Victoria and Pearl Gibbs of the Aborigines Progressive Association in New South Wales.⁹ In 1937, Bibbullmun delegates supported Cooper's historic King George VI petition, which demanded Aboriginal representation in the federal parliament.¹⁰ On 26 January 1938—as white Australia celebrated the sesquicentenary of British landing—Western Australian activists supported the Day of Mourning in Sydney, formally declaring the anniversary a national day of sorrow.¹¹

4. The Inviolable Lineage of Sovereign Courage

The brave men and women of the 1920s and 1930s organised under extraordinary danger.¹² Under the 1905 Act, Chief Protector A.O. Neville possessed absolute legal power to banish any "troublemaker" to Moore River without trial.¹³ That Bodney, Kickett, and their contemporaries spoke out with uncompromising eloquence in the face of state terror stands as a monument to the unextinguished sovereign courage of the Bibbullmun people.¹⁴