1. Introduction (and chapter abstracts) – Laura Cahillane and Donal Coffey
2. The 1922 Constitution; Constituting a Polity – Laura Cahillane
3. The Partition of Ireland and the 1922 Constitution – C.R.G. Murray
4. ‘The Supreme Legislative Authority Speaking as The Mouthpiece of the People’: Constituent Power and the Irish Free State – Alan Greene
5. Opposition to the Constitution of the Irish Free State in 1922 – Thomas Mohr
6. The Representative of the Crown and the Governor-General of the Irish Free State: Text and Context – Graham Butler
7. The National Language and Article 4 of the 1922 Constitution – Róisín Á Costello
8. A new Constitution; a new language? How the new Courts talked about the Free State Constitution 1922 – Maurice Collins
9. ‘Environmental Stewardship’ and Article 11 of the 1922 Constitution – Jamie McLoughlin
10. The 1922 Constitution as a failed attempt to break with Westminster tradition – David Kenny
11. Property Rights and Democratic Decision-Making: Lessons from the 1922 Constitution – Rachael Walsh
12. The Civil War, the Constitution and the Collapse of the Rule of Law – Seán Enright
13. Amending the 1922 Constitution: how the process shaped the politics of a new state – William Quill
14. What the drafters learnt in 1937 from the 1922 experience – Gerard Hogan
15. The Afterlife of the Constitution of the Irish Free State: Constitutional Echoes in South Asia – Donal Coffey
Laura Cahillane is Senior Lecturer in the School of Law at the University of Limerick, Ireland.
Donal Coffey is Assistant Professor in the School of Law and Criminology at the National University of Ireland, Maynooth.
This book deals with a very timely subject: the role, development, and legacy of the first Constitution of independent Ireland within the wider context of the establishment of the State. The 1920s have been receiving increased attention from historians recently (after decades of relative neglect), and the centenary of the State’s foundation will augment that attention. This book continues a recent trend of re-examination of this period and looks at key themes, such as the establishment of institutions under the Irish Free State Constitution and the focus on the ideals of popular sovereignty and democracy. It does so from novel and cross-disciplinary perspectives, and it also looks at areas which have received little to no previous attention; from individual aspects like property rights, the Irish language and environmental rights to aspects such as opposition and partition.
Laura Cahillane is Senior Lecturer in the School of Law at the University of Limerick, Ireland.
Donal Coffey is Assistant Professor in the School of Law and Criminology at the National University of Ireland, Maynooth.