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 SYDNEY, Australia (AP) - Australia on Sunday marked 40 years since a historic referendum granted Aborigines citizenship, but celebrations were muted by stark reminders of the hardships facing the continent's original inhabitants.
An overwhelming 91 percent of Australians voted in favor of reforms in the 1967 referendum that gave the federal government the power to make laws covering Aborigines and to count them in the official census for the first time.
Before then, Aborigines' legal rights varied from state to state, with some jurisdictions including them in laws covering wildlife and plants.
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