Oireachtas

The Oireachtas is the "National Parliament" of the Republic of Ireland. The Oireachtas consists of the President of Ireland and two houses: Dáil Éireann and Seanad Éireann (also known as the Senate). However, the directly-elected Dáil is by far the most powerful branch. The legislature is also sometimes known as Oireachtas Éireann. Both Houses of the Oireachtas currently reside in Leinster House in Dublin an 18th century ducal palace; the two houses are often collectively called the Houses of the Oireachtas.

Composition

Dáil Éireann, the lower house, is directly elected under universal adult suffrage, at least once in every five years as required by law. However, the house can be dissolved at any time at the request of the Taoiseach (head of government) (unless he or she has lost the support of a majority in the Dail, in which case a dissolution can be refused by the President). Dail elections occur under the system of proportional representation by means of the Single Transferable Vote. The Senate is not directly elected but consists of a mixture of members selected in a number of ways, viz 49 members elected by councillors and parliamentarians, and 11 members appointed by the taoiseach. The President of Ireland is directly elected once in every seven years, for a maximum of two terms. However if, as has occurred on a number of occasions, a consensus among political parties means that only a single candidate is nominated, then no actual ballot occurs.

Role

To become law a bill must first be approved by both the Dáil and in most circumstances the Seanad (although the Dail can override a Seanad refusal to pass a Bill), and then signed into law by the President. Bills to amend the Constitution must also be approved by the People prior to being presented to the President. In most circumstances, the President is in effect obliged to sign all laws approved by the Houses of the Oireachtas, although he or she has the power to refer most bills to the Supreme Court for a ruling on constitutionality. The powers of the Seanad are in effect limited to delay rather than veto. It is the Dáil, therefore, that is the supreme tier of the Irish legislature. The enacting formula for Acts of the Oireachtas is simply: "Be it enacted by the Oireachtas as follows:-".

Powers

The Oireachtas has exclusive power to:

• Legislate, including a power vested in the Dail of approving the financial resolutions relevant to the budget.
• Create subordinate legislatures.
• Propose changes to the constitution (must be initiated in the Dail), which must then be submitted to a referendum.
• Raise military or armed forces.
• Allow international agreements to become part of the domestic law of the state.
• Pass certain laws having extra-territorial effect (in accordance with the similar practices of other states).
• Enact, when it considers a state of emergency to exist, almost any law it deems necessary.

Limitations

• Laws are invalid if, and to the extent that, they contradict the constitution.
• In the event of a conflict, EU law also takes precedence over acts of the Oireachtas.
• It may not retrospectively criminalise acts that were not illegal at the time they were committed.
• It may not enact any law providing for the imposition of the death penalty, even during a state of emergency.
• Under the amended Article 3 of the constitution, the Oireachtas does not have the right to legislate in general for Northern Ireland, and its laws now apply only to the Republic and have extra territorial effect only in accordance with internatinoal law. In practice, this has always been the case, and judicial interpretation of the previous Articles 2 and 3 was largely to the same effect.

History

The word oireachtas comes from the Irish language name MacOireachtaigh (Geraghty), believed to have been advisors to ancient King O'Connor and has been the title of two parliaments in Irish history: the current Oireachtas of the Republic of Ireland, since 1937, and, immediately before that, the Oireachtas of the Irish Free State of 1922-1937.

The earliest parliament in Ireland was the Parliament of Ireland, in existence until 1801. This parliament governed the whole island of Ireland but was, over its history, subordinate to varying degrees to the English, and later British, Parliament. This Parliament consisted of the King of Ireland, a House of the Lords and a House of Commons. In 1800 the Irish Parliament abolished itself when, after widespread bribery of members, it adopted the Act of Union, which came into effect from 1 January 1801.

The next legislature to exist in Ireland only came into being in 1919. This was an extra-legal, unicameral parliament established by Irish republicans, known simply as Dáil Éireann (translated as 'Assembly of Ireland'). The First Dáil, as it is known, was notionally a legislature for the whole island of Ireland. In 1920, parallel to the First Dáil, the British government created a home rule legislature entitled the Parliament of Southern Ireland. However this parliament was boycotted by most Irish politicians. It was made up of the King (in this case the monarch of Great Britain and Ireland), the House of Commons of Southern Ireland and the Senate of Southern Ireland. The Parliament of Southern Ireland was formally abolished in 1922, with the establishment of the Oireachtas under the Constitution of the Irish Free State.

The Oireachtas of the Irish Free State consisted officially of the King and two houses, named, as their successors would be, Dáil Éireann (described, in this case, as a 'Chamber of Deputies') and Seanad Éireann. However the Free State Senate was abolished in 1935. The modern Oireachtas came into being in 1937, with the adoption by referendum of the Constitution of Ireland.

Northern Ireland representation

Although the original Article 3 of the constitution asserted the 'right of the parliament and government established by this constitution to exercise jurisdiction' over the whole of Ireland, it also provided that pending the re-integration of the national territory the laws enacted under the Constitution would have the same territorial extent as the laws of the Irish Free State - i.e., in general, law would apply to the 26 Counties only. Therefore no serious attempts were made for the representation of Northern Ireland in the Dail. Eamon de Valera, while a staunch opponent of partition, and while having been originally elected to the Dail for a Northern constituency himself, did not pursue the idea of seats in the Dáil for Northern Ireland, on the grounds that this would amount to representation without taxation, although subsequent Taoisigh have appointed people from the Northern Ireland to the Seanad.

More recently, Sinn Féin has advocated that elected representatives from Stormont, Westminster, or Strasbourg should have the right to participate in Dáil debates, if not voting rights. In 2005 Taoiseach Bertie Ahern proposed that Northern Ireland MPs should be able to address a committee of the whole of House sitting in the Dáil chamber. However both the media and Fine Gael, Labour, the Irish Greens, the Socialist Party and the Ahern's coalition partners the Progressive Democrats all opposed the idea, and did some Oireachtas members from Fianna Fáil. Only Sinn Féin, the party that stood to gain most from the proposal, supported it. The proposal was also criticised widely in the media, with editorials and/or columns published criticising the proposal in The Irish Times, the Irish Independent, the Irish Examiner, the Sunday Independent and other publications. Only the republican-leaning Daily Ireland supported the proposal fully.

This article is licenced under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Oireachtas".