Australia is the only nation on earth, that I know of, that was brought into being on a single day by a single document, January 1st, 1901 by the Australian Constitution. Not even the Americans can claim that, nor for that matter the New Zealanders, the Canadians or anybody else. Australia wasn't a fully independent nation, but still it was a nation.

So. When do we celebrate our national day in the 21 century? Well, January 26th, when a penial colony was set up in the colony of NSW. Makes a lot of sense doesn't it?

Now if the Australian constitution had not been written or had been rejected by the Australian people in a referendum we would not be living in a single nation today! We would be like new Zealand, each colony would have created its own separate nation. The first fleet's arrival would still be in our history books dated January 26th - but we wouldn't be a single nation.

So, the pivotal event that created our single nation was the creation of the 'Australian Constitution' by our founding fathers and it being passed by a referendum and then enacted into law by the British on January 1st 1901.

I say happy new year and Happy Australia Day for January 1st, 2011!

p.s. The public holiday could be moved to March 3rd when we became legally independent from the UK with the signing of the Australia (independence) Act 1986. When we become a republic we could use the Queens birthday as President's day or something.

Yeah, not for celebrating to conquering of a people, but maybe we should celebrate a day when all Australians are seen as equal. Sure, that is a LONG way off yet and what would all the bogans do without being full of piss and waving the flags of nationalism in the faces of immigrants and the indigenous.

But, if it's going to happen maybe pretending there wasn't an invasion is a good idea.

The trouble is that Australia was not "brought into being" on Jan 1st 1901. It was "brought into being" many dozens of thousands of years earlier through aboriginal settlement.

For most of the past 222 years since 1788 we have ignored this "fact". Aboriginal history has been invisible, and to this day there are many amongst us who are happy for that to continue.

The aboriginal people were the founders of our land.

Jockey,

I think you should be using the word 'terra australis' when describing aboriginal settlement thousands of years before, not the term Australia, which is really short for the Commonwealth of Australia. But, it is an undeniable indisputable fact that the different colonies formed into one country on January 1st, 1901 called the commonwealth of AUSTRALIA.

So, I ask all of you again, why do we celebrate 'Australia Day' on the wrong day? January 26th

We celebrate it on the wrong day because we basically invaded aboriginal lands without negotiation or permission when we started the colony. That's why Jan 26th is the wrong day.

Just like 1st Jan is also the wrong day. On the 1st of Jan 1901 we did NOT seek permission or cooperation from aboriginal people for the declaration and content of the Australian Constitution. Officially, the true owners of this continent were thought of as little more than animals, they were not considered citizens with all the normal rights of a citizen. So because of our blatant and inhumane theft of entire aboriginal lands at the time, the 1st of Jan is an incredibly inappropriate day to celebrate Australia Day.

Jockey,

You are talking about terra nullius, this was covered by the High Court in the Mabo case. Maybe you could suggest something useful like using January 26th as Indigenous person's day.