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In short:
The High Court has heard arguments in a Commonwealth challenge to a historic compensation win for Yolngu traditional owners, which found their land had been acquired on unconstitutional grounds.
The Commonwealth Solicitor-General told the court the decision could have sweeping implications for the validity of historic NT land grants.
What's next?
The full bench of the High Court is expected to make a decision in coming months.
The Commonwealth has laid down its challenge to a historic compensation win for Yolngu traditional owners, warning the decision could have sweeping implications for historic land grants in the Northern Territory.
Note to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers: Yunupingu's last name and image are used here in accordance with the wishes of his family.
Last year, the Federal Court found the Commonwealth's grant of a mining lease to Swiss conglomerate Nabalco on the Gove Peninsula in the 1960s was done without the consent of traditional owners.
The court ordered the Commonwealth to award the Gumatj clan $700 million in compensation, before the federal government weeks later launched an appeal in the High Court.
The full bench of the High Court has been sitting in Darwin this week to hear the challenge.
In his opening argument, Commonwealth Solicitor-General Stephen Donaghue KC told the court that if last year's Federal Court decision was allowed to stand, it would expose the Commonwealth to "100 years or more" of compensation claims for land grants awarded in the Northern Territory.
He said that from 1911, when the Northern Territory's governance was surrendered to the Commonwealth by South Australia, a "vast and indeterminate number" of grants had been awarded using the same powers as in the 1968 Nabalco agreement.
"Everything that happened after the Commonwealth accepted the territory is at risk of invalidity," Mr Donaghue said.
The three-day special hearing in Darwin was packed with the legal teams of 34 separate parties to the Commonwealth's challenge, including the attorneys-general of the NT, ACT, Queensland and Western Australia, as well as members of the Northern Land Council.
It was also attended by around 50 senior members of the Gumatj and Rirratjingu clans, and representatives of various Yolngu clans with ties to the Gumatj.
Constitutional powers debated
The hearing's proceedings centred on legal debate about potential limits to the Commonwealth's ability to acquire land through different constitutional acts.
Mr Donaghue told the court the Commonwealth had acquired Gumatj land through territory-specific powers granted by the constitution to the Crown, which the Gumatj's native title rights were "inherently vulnerable" to.
The Commonwealth also argued the Gove Peninsula mineral deposits had been surrendered to the Commonwealth by the SA government, prior to its surrender of the NT in 1911.
Commonwealth silk Stephen Lloyd SC told the court that in the 1930s, the entirety of the NT's mineral deposits had been acquired by the Crown through legislation, "out of the range" of the "just terms" provision of the constitution — a section that limits the Crown's powers around the acquisition of property.
In its submissions, the Commonwealth said that if the Federal Court was correct, then when the Native Title Act commenced in 1993, "[the Commonwealth] would have become liable to pay compensation of a vast but presently unquantifiable amount".
In response, the Gumatj clan's submissions said the "just terms" provision had to be applied "coherently" across the constitution, and there was no reason the constitution should not protect Territorians' property rights.
In its own submissions responding to the appeal, the NT government said the Commonwealth's "just terms" argument should be thrown out, and that its challenge should be subject to further hearings.
The High Court justices reserved their judgement.
A decision is expected to be handed down in coming months.