Courts of Justice Act 1924

The Courts of Justice Act 1924 (Irish: Acht Cúirteanna Breithiúnais, 1924) was an Act of the Oireachtas (No. 10 of 1924) that established a new system of courts for the Irish Free State (now Ireland or the Republic of Ireland). Among the new courts was the Supreme Court of the Irish Free State, and the first Chief Justice of the Irish Free State was also appointed under the Act.

Courts of Justice Act 1924
Oireachtas
  • AN ACT FOR THE ESTABLISHMENT OF COURTS OF JUSTICE PURSUANT TO THE CONSTITUTION OF SAORSTAT EIREANN AND FOR PURPOSES RELATING TO THE BETTER ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE.
CitationNo. 10 of 1924
Territorial extentRepublic of Ireland
Enacted byDáil Éireann
Enacted bySeanad Éireann
Commenced24 June 1924
Status: Current legislation

Once the Act came into operation, the courts previously established by the Parliament of the United Kingdom (when Ireland was still part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland) ceased to exist. In parallel with this process, the revolutionary Dáil Courts system created in 1919 during the War of Independence was also wound up, by Acts passed in 1923 and 1925.

The long title of the Act was:

An Act for the establishment of courts of justice pursuant to the Constitution of Saorstát Éireann and for purposes relating to the better administration of justice. [12th April, 1924.]

Court structure

The jurisdiction of all of the courts then sitting in the Irish Free State was transferred to the new courts created by the Act:

The offices of justice of the peace and resident magistrate were permanently abolished. As a result there would in principle no longer be any lay magistrates in the Irish Free State: all judges would be legally qualified and would work full-time. However, the lay office of peace commissioner was created to exercise some of the functions of magistrates. Section 88(2) of the Act also required that a Peace Commission for a county in the Gaeltacht should "have a knowledge of the Irish language adequate for the transaction of the business of his office in that language".

All criminal prosecutions would now take place in the name of the People at the suit of the Attorney General, rather than The King as had previously been the case.

The Act did not affect the right of appeal from the Free State to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in London.

Judicial appointments

Only two judges who held positions under the old court system were appointed to the courts established under this Act: Charles O'Connor, who had been Master of the Rolls in Ireland from 1912, was appointed to the Supreme Court, and William Wylie was appointed to the High Court.

Subsequent developments

Abolition of the Court of the High Court Circuit

The Act established a Central Criminal Court to hear serious criminal cases in Dublin and the neighbouring counties, and made provision for Courts of the High Court Circuit (essentially, the Assizes in renamed form) to do the same outside Dublin. However the commissions for these courts were never sent out, leading to a backlog of defendants committed to trial before the courts but not being tried.[1] Amending legislation (the Courts of Justice Act 1926) abolished the Courts of the High Court Circuit and transferred their jurisdiction to the Central Criminal Court.[2] A serious criminal trial was not again held outside Dublin until the Central Criminal Court sat in Limerick in 2003.[3]

Abolition of the right of appeal to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council

The Constitution (Amendment No. 22) Act 1933 abolished the right of appeal from the Supreme Court of the Irish Free State to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council. The Judicial Committee recognised in Moore vs Attorney General that the Statute of Westminster 1931 had allowed the Irish Free State to do this unilaterally despite abrogating the Anglo-Irish Treaty.[4]

After the 1937 Constitution

The courts structure established by the 1924 Act remained largely unchanged in the decades after. When the Courts (Establishment and Constitution) Act 1961 established the new courts envisaged by the 1937 constitution, it merely re-established all the existing courts (removing the "of Justice" from their names to disambiguate) with the same jurisdictions as before. A Special Criminal Court was established in 1972 for the trial of certain offences by a three-judge panel rather than by jury. In 2014, a new Court of Appeal was created with appellate jurisdiction from the High Court, after an amendment to the Constitution the previous year.

See also

References
  1. "Dáil Éireann debate – CEISTEANNA—QUESTIONS. ORAL ANSWERS. – UNTRIED PRISONERS IN CUSTODY". www.oireachtas.ie. Houses of the Oireachtas. 11 November 1925. Archived from the original on 13 February 2020. Retrieved 25 September 2021.
  2. "electronic Irish Statute Book (eISB) – Courts of Justice Act, 1926". www.irishstatutebook.ie. Archived from the original on 9 August 2020. Retrieved 25 September 2021.
  3. Hogan, Eugene (23 July 2003). "Judge issues stiff warning as murderer jailed for life". Irish Independent. Archived from the original on 13 February 2020. Retrieved 25 September 2021.
  4. Robert Lyon Moore and others (Petition) v The Attorney General for the Irish Free State and others (Irish Free State) (1935) UKPC 34 (6 June 1935), bailii.org
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