After the defeat of the
Aboriginal plaintiffs in
Milirrpum v Nabalco Pty Ltd, the first
Aboriginal land rights case in Australia, a deliberate decision to pursue a political course rather than legal challenge to the
High Court of Australia was taken by the lawyers, one of whom was Edward Woodward. At the time, the membership of the Court was likely to reject
Justice Blackburn's finding that there was a coherent system of Aboriginal law relating to land. By not having the appeal rejected by the High Court, the findings of Justice Blackburn that were favourable to the plaintiffs (and by extension to other Aboriginal Australian peoples, and the concept of land rights was maintained as a possibility, at least until the membership of the High Court had changed. In 1972 at the launch of his party's election campaign, Gough Whitlam, as Labor Opposition Leader, promised if elected to legislate for Aboriginal land rights in the
Northern Territory of Australia. When elected, rather than introduce a national land rights law, the
Whitlam government chose instead to establish a precedent in the Commonwealth controlled Northern Territory. The
Northern Land Council and
Central Land Council were established in the same year to assist with the work of the commission. ==The Royal Commission==