History
Traditional histories of parliament, whether Irish or otherwise, have generally treated them as political events. This book considers the seventeenth-century Irish Parliament as an ongoing element within the state. It considers the role of parliament within the context of an overall state apparatus of governance and charts its development over time. While parliament developed in conjunction with the Irish state, local politicians, and local institutions, it was also a colonial institution, taking direction from Westminster on how to operate. Whether by design or by chance, it resembles the Westminster model of parliamentary procedure, but it also had specifically Irish traits in how it dispatched its business. This book describes a developing institution chiefly through the work that it undertook. Most will be well aware of parliament’s work on legislation and the creation of law and also representation of communities and locations, but it spent large amounts of time hearing petitions and undertaking judicial work. It undertook these ever-increasing responsibilities with a growing group of parliamentary officers, who had a wide variety of powers and responsibilities. Naturally this led to a sophisticated set of procedures and privileges in undertaking this work in order to increase its efficiency and productivity. This book discusses topics and describes processes that are still very much a cornerstone for today’s parliamentary democracy in Ireland and will resonate in Irish institutional culture and elsewhere in the common law world.
The passing of legislation was of great importance to both government and community in early modern Ireland. It frequently was the mechanism by which grievances were addressed and also how finance was secured. This chapter considers the relevance of legislation and also the relevance of Poynings’ Law to the passage of legislation in Ireland. It also considers the relative importance of the creation of statute law in the Irish legal system. This chapter takes the reader through the various stages of legislation in the Irish Parliament, an area that has been relatively ignored when compared with the focus of studies on Poynings’ Law.
In a book that deals with procedure and focuses a little less on MPs and politics than other works, a chapter on the officers and servants of parliament brings light onto this sometimes forgotten corner of parliament. While nobody could fail to acknowledge the importance of the speaker of either house, this book brings a sharp concentration of the very important roles of the judges and other legal officers, on the all-important clerk and his juniors, and on the lesser officers of parliament. It discusses the role of the officers, their responsibilities, and the capacity for influence on political and other developments in parliament. It also describes the payment and other rewards they received for their work.
Petitioning, either as a general call for favour and assistance, or as the opening salvo in a legal action, was a common process in the Irish Parliament and there is strong evidence that it took up a considerable amount of time, frequently much more than legislation did. This chapter considers both the theory and practice of petitioning. It discusses how and why it happened, the methodology and materials of the process, the role of counsel, officers, and members. It also provides the statistical evidence of how the system worked and to what extent certain petitioners and types of petitions were more successful than others.
The two constituent parts of parliament were generally self-regulating in their behaviour. With the exception of statute law that did stipulate certain ways for parliament to behave, the Commons and the Lords organised the way they undertook their business and how their members should conduct themselves. This meant that parliamentary privilege for the member and the liberties of each house were jealously guarded. These were certain rights to avoid arrest, to be free from civil actions, and also for the house to dominate certain areas, for example appellate oversight of other courts or finance. The author convincingly asserts that while privilege could well be the domain of the petty and self-interested, its fundamental purpose was to preserve the individual roles and promote their smooth running.