Oireachtas (Irish Free State)

A series of constitutional amendments in 1936 substantially altered the functioning of the Oireachtas:

• The King ceased to be a part of the Oireachtas, and the responsibility for signing bills into law became a formality exercised by the Ceann Comhairle.
• The Seanad was abolished so the Irish Free State Oireachtas consisted solely of the Dáil.
• The original oath was abolished.
• The requirement for laws and constitutional amendments to comply with the Anglo-Irish Treaty was removed.
• The power to dissolve the legislature was exercised by the Ceann Comhairle when instructed to do so by the President of the Executive Council.

Under the Constitution of the Irish Free State membership of the Dáil was open to all citizens who had reached the age of twenty-one. However those who were legally disqualified or who were members of the Seanad were excluded. For most of the period of the Irish Free State the constitution also contained a controversial requirement that all members of the Oireachtas swear an oath of fidelity to the King, as well as an Oath of Allegiance to the constitution of the Free State. The oath was, however, abolished by a constitutional amendment in 1936.

The Dáil was elected on the basis of universal adult suffrage by "proportional representation" and the single transferable vote. The franchise was restricted to those over twenty-one. As adopted, the constitution required that term of a Dáil would last for four years, unless the law specified a shorter period or the house was dissolved early. However, after changes to the constitution and the law in 1927, the constitutional maximum became six years, and the legal maximum five.

While every Irish Government since 1937 has restricted Dáil constituencies to a maximum of five seats, during the Irish Free State there were several six-, seven- and eight-seat constituencies. During the Irish Free State Galway was a single nine-seat constituency. As well as geographical constituencies, there were two university constituencies: Dublin University and the National University. The franchise for the university constituencies was open to all those who had been awarded degrees from either institution. However anyone voting in a university constituency was excluded from voting in their geographical district. The constitution required that each return three TDs, regardless of population. Because these constituencies had much lower populations that the ordinary geographical constituencies this resulted in malapportionment. The university constituencies were abolished in 1936 under the Constitution (Amendment No. 23) Act 1936 and the Electoral (University Constituencies) Act. However, in 1937 university constituencies would be revived for the newly created Seanad.

The following general elections took place to the Free State Dáil during its existence:

• 1922 general election
• 1923 general election
• 1927 general election (June)
• 1927 general election (September)
• 1932 general election
• 1933 general election
• 1937 general election

The Dáil Chamber as it currently stands.
Unusually, the government sits on the Speaker's left, unlike the norm in most Westminster system parliaments, where the government sits on the speaker's right.

The Constitution of the Irish Free State provided that the President of the Executive Council would be appointed by the King "on the nomination of" the Dáil and that the Executive Council as a whole had to resign en bloc if it lost the confidence of the lower house. In practice these provision meant that the President was chosen by the Dáil, which could bring down his cabinet by a vote of no confidence, or failure to approve a vote of confidence. A constitutional amendment passed in 1936 removed the role of the King entirely and provided that, in the final months of the Free State, the President would be elected by the Dáil directly, rather than merely being 'nominated' by the lower house.

Technically a bill had to be approved by both Houses of the Oireachtas and to receive the Royal Assent to become law. However, in practice it was the Dáil that decided what laws would be enacted and repealed. Before its complete abolition the Free State Seanad merely had power to delay legislation.

While during the early years of the Irish Free State there existed a theoretical possibility that the King, or the Governor-General acting on his behalf, might veto an act of the Oireachtas or dismiss the Executive Council against the wishes of the Dáil. With the passage of the Royal and Parliamentary Titles Act 1927 the British Government lost the right to formally advise the King in relation to the Irish Free State and so the possibility of the Governor-General taking any action without the approval of the other institutions of government was a remote possibility.

Unlike its modern successor, the Dáil did not have authority to declare war, this power being reserved for the Oireachtas as a whole. However, in practice this distinction was not important. During the later days of the Irish Free State the Dáil, as the dominant component of the Oireachtas, had the effective authority to amend the constitution in any way it chose. Today this is a level of authority that no Dáil has had since 1941.

The Seanad was subordinate to Dáil and could delay but not veto decisions of that house. Nonetheless, the Seanad had more power than its successor, the modern Seanad, which can only delay normal legislation for three months. As originally adopted the constitution provided that the Seanad had power to delay a money bill for 21 days and delay any other bill for 270 days. The Constitution (Amendment No. 13) Act, passed on 23 July 1928 extended the Seanad's power of delay over (non-money) legislation from 9 months to 20 months.

The 1922 version of the Constitution provided for a Seanad of 60 members directly elected. Members would serve 12-year terms, with one quarter of the house elected every three years. The members would be elected under the system of proportional representation by means of the single transferable vote in a single, nationwide, 15 seat constituency.

However, to get the house started, the body's initial membership would be appointed by Dáil and the President of the Executive Council. To complicate matters even further, after the holding of the first direct election, the constitution was amended by the Constitution (Amendment No. 6) Act, passed on 23 July 1928, so that the final three elections to the Seanad occurred by a method of indirect election. Therefore, in the 5 elections to the Seanad to occur before its abolition, 3 different systems were used.

It was originally required that membership of the Seanad be limited to those who were over 35 who would serve 12-year terms. The Constitution (Amendment No. 8) Act, passed on 25 October 1928, reduced the minimum age of eligibility for Seanad members to 30 and the Constitution (Amendment No. 7) Act, passed on 30 October 1928, reduced the term of office of senators to 9 years.

Today incarnations of the modern Seanad are given a new number after each Seanad election. Thus, the Seanad elected in 2020 is known as the 26th Seanad. This was not the custom during the Irish Free State because the Seanad was elected in stages and therefore considered to be in permanent session. However, as a gesture of continuity with its predecessor, the first Seanad elected after 1937 is numbered as the Second Seanad. The Seanad, despite the occurrence of three senatorial elections before its abolition, is considered to have been a single Seanad for the duration of its existence and is thus referred for that whole period as the First Seanad.

Half the initial membership of the Seanad was elected by the Dáil under the single transferable vote. The remaining half was appointed by the President of the Executive Council (prime minister), W. T. Cosgrave. Those elected by the Dáil were divided into two equal groups by lot, one assigned terms of three years and the other terms of nine years. Those appointed by the president were similarly divided and assigned terms of 6 years and 12 years. The President agreed to use his appointments in 1922 to grant extra representation to the Protestant minority in the state, most of whom were former Southern Unionists, to promote inclusiveness in the new Free State. As a result, of the sixty members of the first Seanad, as well as 36 Catholics, there were 20 Protestants, 3 Quakers and 1 Jew. It contained 7 peers, a dowager countess, 5 baronets and several knights. The New York Times remarked that the first Seanad was "representative of all classes", though it has also been described as, "the most curious political grouping in the history of the Irish state".[8] Members included William Butler Yeats, Oliver St. John Gogarty and General Sir Bryan Mahon.

The opponents of the Anglo-Irish Treaty also opposed the new Seanad, and 37 of the senators' homes were burnt to the ground. Others were intimidated, kidnapped or almost assassinated. Nevertheless, the first Seanad greatly influenced the guiding principles and legislative foundations of the new state.[8]

The first Cathaoirleach was Lord Glenavy, formerly the Lord Chief Justice of Ireland in 1916–21.

The 15 original 3-year seats came up for election in 1925, as did four other seats which had been filled temporarily by co-option. The 19 retiring members were automatically eligible for re-election; another 19 candidates were nominated by the Seanad (by the single transferable vote from a list of 29); the Dáil nominated 38 candidates (from a list of 57, again by the single transferable vote). The 76 candidates were then put to the public electorate on 17 September 1925, but without partisan campaigning, turnout was less than a quarter of the 1,345,000 potential voters. The count took two weeks. Only 8 of the former senators were re-elected, with particularly poor results for the Gaelic League and Douglas Hyde.[9]

After the amendment of the constitution in 1928, future members of the Seanad were to be elected from a single constituency consisting of the combined membership of the outgoing Seanad and the Dáil, and the system was changed so that a third rather than a quarter of the Seanad would be replaced at each election. The elections were still held by secret ballot and under the single transferable vote. Elections took place under the new system in 1928, 1931, and 1934 before the Seanad was abolished in 1936.

The system for nominating candidates was also changed. After 1928, it was provided that the number of nominees would be equal to twice the number of seats to be filled and that half would be elected by the Dáil and the other half by the Seanad. Both houses used the single transferable vote for this purpose. The right of outgoing senators to nominate themselves was removed.

The constitution originally provided that premature vacancies would be filled by a vote of the Seanad. However, a candidate elected in this way would serve only until the next senatorial election, when the seat would come up for election along with the others scheduled to be filled. The system was changed by the Constitution (Amendment No. 11) Act, passed on 17 December 1929, so that vacancies were filled by members of both houses voting together.

As adopted the Constitution of the Irish Free State contained a number of provisions for direct democracy, which included a special role for the Seanad. Most importantly it was provided that the Seanad could, if three-fifths of its members agreed, demand a binding referendum on any bill. This was to allow the Seanad to appeal to voters directly if there was a disagreement between the two houses and if the Dáil attempted to override the Seanad. However, this power was taken from the Seanad in 1928 before it had been put into use. It was in compensation for this loss that the Seanad's powers of delay were increased in the same year.

Before it was removed, the Seanad's right to demand a referendum was contained in Article 47, which provided for voters to veto legislation directly in certain circumstances. The article provided that once a bill had been approved by both houses of the Oireachtas (or just by the Dáil, if it had over-ridden the Seanad), its enactment into law could be suspended if, within seven days, either a majority of the Seanad or three-fifths of all members of the Dáil so requested.

There would then be a further period of ninety days within which either 5% of all registered voters or 60% of the Seanad could demand a referendum on the bill. The referendum would be decided by a majority of votes cast and if rejected the bill would not become law. Article 47 did not apply to money bills or bills declared by both houses to be "necessary for the immediate preservation of the public peace, health or safety". The Constitution (Amendment No. 10) Act, passed on 12 July 1928, repealed Article 47 in its entirety, along with Article 48 which provided for an initiative process.

A similar power given to the Free State Seanad by Article 47 is granted to the modern Seanad by the 1937 Constitution of Ireland. Under the current constitution, a simple majority of senators (with the agreement of one-third of the Dáil) can request that the President of Ireland refer a bill to the people. The President can thus refuse to sign it until it has been approved either in an ordinary referendum or by the Dáil after it has reassembled after a general election. This power has never been used because the modern Seanad is designed in such a way as to have a permanent government majority.

The Seanad was abolished entirely in 1936 after it delayed some Government proposals for constitutional changes by the Constitution (Amendment No. 24) Act which was passed on 29 May 1936. Éamon de Valera had seen its delay of his proposals as illegitimate; the continuing opposition majority had stemmed from a combination of his earlier boycott of the Free State Oireachtas and the provision for the Seanad's self-election. The abolition was highly controversial at the time and the last chairman Thomas Westropp Bennett played a key role. It opposed its own abolition, but this decision was over-ridden by the Dáil.

In the 1937 Constitution of Ireland de Valera created a new modern Seanad, Seanad Éireann. This new Seanad was considered to be the direct successor of the Free State Seanad.