Southern ireland
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Deisceart Éireann Southern Ireland Southern Ireland 1921–1922 |
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| Constitution | Government of Ireland Act (1920) | ||||
| Capital | Dublin | ||||
| Form of government | Federal Kingdom | ||||
| Form of government | Constitutional monarchy | ||||
| Head of state | British King | ||||
| Head of government | Chairman of the Provisional Government | ||||
| Existence period | 1921-1922 | ||||
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Southern Ireland ( Irish Deisceart Éireann , English Southern Ireland ) was the official name of the state that was created by the Government of Ireland Act 1920 and comprised 26 of 32 Irish counties . The legislative power of the state was the Parliament of Southern Ireland . The law formally divided the island into Northern Ireland and Southern Ireland . Both countries got a bicameral parliament and a separate executive . There were, however, two connections: the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, who represented the king in both countries, and the so-called Council of Ireland , a political body that took over the coordination between the two governments and that, as the Irish nationalists were promised, the Should represent the beginning of an all-Ireland parliament.
history
The Government of Ireland Act , also known as the 4th Home Rule , was designed to find a solution to the problem that preoccupied Irish politics since the 1880s: the dispute between unionists and nationalists. Nationalists have sought some form of Home Rule for decades as they wanted to experience Ireland without British rule. Unionists, on the other hand, feared that a nationalist government in Dublin would discriminate against Protestants and introduce taxes mainly aimed at the agricultural counties in the northeast. Extremist unionists then imported weapons from the German Reich at an early stage and founded the Ulster Volunteer Force to prevent the enforcement of the Home Rule in Ulster . In return, nationalists also imported weapons and founded the Irish Volunteers in 1913 . The final division through the Government of Ireland Act was originally intended to be only a transitional state.
In reality, however, southern Ireland never became a functioning everyday life - in contrast to Northern Ireland, where a working parliament was formed, which lasted in this form until 1972. The first election to the House of Commons in South Ireland in 1921 was viewed by Sinn Féin as the election to Parliament of the Irish Revolutionary Republic , which was unilaterally proclaimed in 1916 but never recognized. Sinn Féin won 124 of 128 votes, but at the first meeting of the Southern Irish Parliament in June 1921, only the four elected Unionists appeared (the elected Sinn Féin members instead gathered as the Second Dáil ), so that there is no mention of a Southern Irish government could.
It was not until January 1922 that the House of Commons in southern Ireland took on a leading role. Since the revolutionary parliament was never recognized in British politics, the southern Irish House of Commons remained the only legal one in the eyes of the British. When the Anglo-Irish Treaty was created in 1921 , the question arose as to which of the two state powers (the South Irish lower house or the revolutionary parliament of the Second Dáil) had to approve this treaty from the Irish side. Since neither side wanted to give in, the contract was ultimately recognized by both bodies (the composition of which was almost identical).
In retrospect, southern Ireland was - only on paper - a state of its own, which stood in the shadow of the revolutionary Irish Republic and which, as a result of the Anglo-Irish Treaty, became part of the Irish Free State in December 1922 . On the other hand, the co-negotiator in the signing of the treaty and subsequent chairman of the Provisional Government of Southern Ireland, Michael Collins, is seen as an important figure in Irish independence.
See also
Remarks
- ↑ The term Southern Ireland is sometimes used as an unofficial name for the Irish Republic or the early Irish Free State - especially in the English media landscape. This should not be confused with the name of this state. Above all, the IRA wants to show a contrast to Northern Ireland and denounce the division of the island. However, Southern Ireland has not officially been used since 1922.