The Referendum Act 1998 (No. 1/1998) is an act of the Oireachtas which modified how referendums are carried out in Ireland. The act was necessary following the McKenna case in which the Supreme Court of Ireland held that the spending of public money in support of the campaign for a government-approved outcome of a constitutional referendum was unconstitutional. To rectify the imbalance, this act was introduced. Its main provision was to provide for the establishment of a Referendum Commission prior to each future referendum.
 | This legislation article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
| This article relating to law in Ireland is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
The legislatures of the United Kingdom are derived from a number of different sources. The parliament of the United Kingdom is the supreme legislative body for the United Kingdom and the British overseas territories with Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland each having their own devolved legislatures. Each of the three major jurisdictions of the United Kingdom has its own laws and legal system.
The Northern Ireland Act 1998 is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom which established a devolved legislature for Northern Ireland, the Northern Ireland Assembly, after decades of direct rule from Westminster.
Referendums in the United Kingdom are occasionally held at a national, regional or local level. Historically, national referendums are rare due to the ancient principle of parliamentary sovereignty: there is no constitutional requirement to hold a national referendum for any purpose or on any issue; but the UK Parliament is free to legislate though a Act of Parliament for a national plebiscite to be held on any question at any time but cannot be constitutionally binding on either the Government or Parliament, although they usually have a persuasive political effect.
The Good Friday Agreement referendum, 1998 was a referendum held in Northern Ireland over whether there was support for the Good Friday Agreement. The result was a majority (71.1%) in favour. A simultaneous referendum held in the Republic of Ireland produced an even larger majority (94.4%) in favour.
The Tenth Amendment of the Constitution Act 1987 is an amendment to the Constitution of Ireland that permitted the state to ratify the Single European Act. It was approved by referendum on 26 May 1987 and signed into law on 22 June of the same year.
The Eighteenth Amendment of the Constitution Act 1998 is an amendment of the Constitution of Ireland which permitted the state to ratify the Treaty of Amsterdam. It was approved by referendum on 22 May 1998 and signed into law on the 3 June of the same year. The referendum was held on the same day as the referendum on Nineteenth Amendment, which related to approval of the Good Friday Agreement.
The Twentieth Amendment of the Constitution Act 2001 is an amendment to the Constitution of Ireland which provided constitutional recognition of local government and required that local government elections occur at least once in every five years. It was approved by referendum on 11 June 1999 and signed into law on 23 June of the same year. The referendum was held the same day as the local and European Parliament elections.
The Twenty-first Amendment of the Constitution Act 2001 is an amendment of the Constitution of Ireland which introduced a constitutional ban on the death penalty and removed all references to capital punishment from the text. It was approved by referendum on 7 June 2001 and signed into law on 27 March 2002. The referendum was held on the same day as referendums on the ratification of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, which was also approved, and on the ratification of the Nice Treaty, which was rejected.
The Twenty-third Amendment of the Constitution Act 2001 of the Constitution of Ireland permitted the state to become a party to the International Criminal Court (ICC). It was approved by referendum on 7 June 2001 and signed into law on the 27 March 2002. The referendum was held on the same day as referendums on the prohibition of the death penalty, which was also approved, and on the ratification of the Nice Treaty, which was rejected.
The Twenty-sixth Amendment of the Constitution Act 2002 is an amendment of the Constitution of Ireland which permitted the state to ratify the Treaty of Nice. It was approved by referendum on 19 October 2002 and signed into law on 7 November of the same year. The amendment followed a previous failed attempt to approve the Nice Treaty which was rejected in the first Nice referendum held in 2001.
Amendments to the Constitution of Ireland are only possible by way of referendum. A proposal to amend the Constitution of Ireland must first be approved by both Houses of the Oireachtas (parliament), then submitted to a referendum, and finally signed into law by the President of Ireland. Since the constitution entered into force on 29 December 1937, there have been 32 amendments to the constitution.
The Nineteenth Amendment of the Constitution is an amendment of the Constitution of Ireland which permitted the state to be bound by the British–Irish Agreement and enabled the establishment of shared political institutions between Ireland and Northern Ireland. It also provided a mechanism for a further amendment to the Constitution upon a declaration by the government on the implementation of the Agreement, most notably by changing Articles 2 and 3 from an irredentist claim on the whole island of Ireland to an aspiration towards creating a united Ireland by peaceful means, "with the consent of a majority of the people, democratically expressed, in both jurisdictions in the island".
United Ireland, also referred to as Irish reunification, is the proposition that all of Ireland should be a single sovereign state. At present, the island is divided politically; the sovereign Republic of Ireland has jurisdiction over the majority of Ireland, while Northern Ireland, which lies entirely within the Irish province of Ulster, is part of the United Kingdom. Achieving a united Ireland is a central tenet of Irish nationalism, particularly of both mainstream and dissident Irish republican political and paramilitary organisations. Unionists support Northern Ireland remaining part of the United Kingdom, and therefore oppose Irish unification.
The Northern Ireland Constitution Act 1973 is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom which received the royal assent on 18 July 1973. The Act abolished the suspended Parliament of Northern Ireland and the post of Governor and made provision for a devolved administration consisting of an Executive chosen by the new Northern Ireland Assembly devised under the Sunningdale Agreement; the Assembly had already been created by the Northern Ireland Assembly Act 1973, passed two months earlier.
The Catholic Democrats was an minor conservative political party in Ireland that existed between 1995 and 2019. It was initially known as the National Party and later as the Christian Democrats before adopting its final name.
Members of the Legislative Assembly are representatives elected by the voters to the Northern Ireland Assembly.
The Twenty-fourth Amendment of the Constitution Bill 2001 was a proposed amendment to the Constitution of Ireland to allow the state to ratify the Treaty of Nice of the European Union. The proposal was rejected in a referendum held in June 2001, sometimes referred to as the first Nice referendum. The referendum was held on the same day as referendums on the prohibition of the death penalty and on the ratification of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, both of which were approved.
A Referendum Commission is an independent statutory body in Ireland which is set up in advance of any referendum. The Referendum Act 1998 as amended by the Referendum Act 2001 provides for the establishment of the body.
Feminism in Ireland has played a major role in shaping the legal and social position of women in present-day Ireland. The role of women has been influenced by numerous legal changes in the second part of the 20th century, especially in the 1970s.
In the United Kingdom, devolution is the Parliament of the United Kingdom's statutory granting of a greater level of self-government to the Scottish Parliament, the Senedd, the Northern Ireland Assembly and the London Assembly and to their associated executive bodies the Scottish Government, the Welsh Government, the Northern Ireland Executive and in England, the Greater London Authority and combined authorities.