Upper house of the Parliament of Ireland that existed until 1800
The
Irish House of Lords
was the
upper house
of the
Parliament of Ireland
that existed from medieval times until the end of 1800. It was also the
final court of appeal
of the
Kingdom of Ireland
.
It was modelled on the
House of Lords of England
, with members of the
Peerage of Ireland
sitting in the Irish Lords, just as members of the
Peerage of England
did at Westminster. When the
Act of Union 1800
abolished the Irish parliament, a subset of Irish peers sat as
Irish representative peers
in the
House of Lords
of the merged
Parliament of the United Kingdom
.
[2]
History
[
edit
]
The Lords started as a group of barons in the
Lordship of Ireland
that was generally limited to the
Pale
, a variable area around Dublin where English law was in effect, but did extend to the rest of Ireland. They sat as a group, not as a separate House, from the first meeting of the
Parliament of Ireland
in 1297. From the establishment of the
Kingdom of Ireland
in 1542 the Lords included a large number of new Gaelic and Norman lords under the policy of
surrender and regrant
.
Religious division was reflected in the House, but as late as the 1689 "
Patriot Parliament
" a majority of Lords had remained
Roman Catholics
, while the administration and a slight majority in the Commons were
Anglicans
, adherents of the
Church of Ireland
. In 1634 the campaign to secure
"The Graces"
came to a head. Most of these Catholic lords lost their titles in the ensuing
1641 rebellion
, notably during the 1652
Cromwellian Settlement
. These dispossessed lords were regranted their titles (if not always their lands) after the
Restoration of 1660
by the
Act of Settlement 1662
. Others took the losing side in the
Williamite War in Ireland
(1689?91), and a much smaller number of them were re-granted their lands in the 18th century.
By the 1790s most of the Lords personified and wanted to protect the "
Protestant Ascendancy
". By the time of the abolition of the Irish House of Lords in 1800 some of the peerages were very ancient, such as the
lords Kingsale
, created in 1397, and the
viscounts Gormanston
from 1478. The first
Earl of Kildare
had been created in 1316.
Following the
Act of Union in 1800
, the
peerage of Ireland
elected just 28 of their number to sit in the
United Kingdom House of Lords
, described as the "
Irish representative peers
". This practice ended in 1922 with the establishment of the
Irish Free State
. Other newly created Irish peers, such as
Clive of India
, the
Earl of Carysfort
and
Lord Curzon
, were still able to stand for election to the
House of Commons of the United Kingdom
(not being
UK peers
) if they were not a representative peer. This was a convenient way of giving a title for reasons of prestige to someone who expected to sit in the British House of Commons.
[3]
Today the 18th-century
Irish Parliament building
on
College Green
in
Dublin
is an office of the commercial
Bank of Ireland
, and visitors can view the Irish House of Lords chamber within the building.
Function
[
edit
]
The Parliament of Ireland was a
bicameral
legislature
, and
bills
could originate in either the Commons or the Lords; both had to pass a bill for it to stand a chance of becoming law. Either house could amend or reject the others' proposals. Under
Poynings' Law
, matters passed by the Irish parliament had to be approved and could be amended by the
Irish Privy Council
and
English Privy Council
; main debates before this stage were thus technically on "heads of bills". Following approval the Parliament of Ireland voted on the formal finalised "bill" (which could only be rejected or passed unamended).
The Lords was the highest
court of appeal
in Ireland, same as the
Lords were in England
. However, the controversial British
Declaratory Act 1719
asserted the right of the Lords in Westminster to overrule the Irish Lords. The
Irish Patriot Party
secured the repeal of the Declaratory Act as part of the
Constitution of 1782
.
The House of Lords was presided over by the
Lord Chancellor
, who sat on the
woolsack
, a large seat stuffed with wool from each of the three lands of England, Ireland and Scotland. At the state opening of the Irish parliament Members of Parliament were summoned to the House of Lords from the House of Commons chamber by
Black Rod
, a royal official who would "command the members on behalf of His Excellency to attend him in the chamber of peers". Sessions were formally opened by the
Speech from the Throne
by the
Lord Lieutenant
, who sat on the throne beneath a canopy of crimson velvet.
Sessions were generally held at
Dublin Castle
in the 16th and 17th centuries, until the opening of the
Irish Houses of Parliament
in the 1730s.
See also
[
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]
External links
[
edit
]
- Journals of the House of Lords
- Vol 1
Vol 2
Vol 3
Vol 4
Vol 5
Vol 6
Vol 7
Vol 8
Proceedings 1634?1800; printed 1779?1800; large (~1 GB)
PDF
files from the
Oireachtas
library
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Pre-Union
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War of Independence
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Home rule
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Post-independence
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Northern Ireland post-1972
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History
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General
and events
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Acts of
Parliament
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Gaelic
conquests
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Politics
and society
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Monarchs
and rulers
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