The Executive Powers (Consequential Provisions) Act, 1937 was an Act of the Oireachtas which retrospectively completed the abolition of the
Governor-General of the Irish Free State
The Governor-General of the Irish Free State ( ga, Seanascal Shaorstát Éireann) was the official representative of the sovereign of the Irish Free State from 1922 to 1936. By convention, the office was largely ceremonial. Nonetheless, it wa ...
.
In December 1936, then
President of the Executive Council of the Irish Free State
The president of the Executive Council of the Irish Free State ( ga, Uachtarán ar Ard-Chomhairle Shaorstát Éireann) was the head of government or prime minister of the Irish Free State which existed from 1922 to 1937. He was the chairman of t ...
Éamon de Valera
Éamon de Valera (, ; first registered as George de Valero; changed some time before 1901 to Edward de Valera; 14 October 1882 – 29 August 1975) was a prominent Irish statesman and political leader. He served several terms as head of govern ...
had ensured the passage of the Constitution (Amendment No. 27) Act, intended to abolish the office of governor-general. However he was advised by his Attorney-General,
James Geoghegan
James Geoghegan (8 December 1886 – 27 March 1951) was an Irish Fianna Fáil politician, barrister and judge who served as a Judge of the Supreme Court from 1936 to 1950, Attorney General of Ireland from November 1936 to December 1936 and Mini ...
, the Secretary to the Executive Council, Maurice Moynihan and Mr Matheson of the Parliamentary Draftsman's office that that Act did not actually abolish the office. They informed de Valera that removing the governor-generalship from the
Irish Free State Constitution
The Constitution of the Irish Free State ( ga, Bunreacht Shaorstát Eireann) was adopted by Act of Dáil Éireann sitting as a constituent assembly on 25 October 1922. In accordance with Article 83 of the Constitution,Letters Patent from the King constructing and regulating the office
*
Orders in Council
An Order-in-Council is a type of legislation in many countries, especially the Commonwealth realms. In the United Kingdom this legislation is formally made in the name of the monarch by and with the advice and consent of the Privy Council (''King ...
*
Statutory Instrument
In many countries, a statutory instrument is a form of delegated legislation.
United Kingdom
Statutory instruments are the principal form of delegated or secondary legislation in the United Kingdom.
National government
Statutory instrumen ...
s
*
Statute law
Statutory law or statute law is written law passed by a body of legislature. This is opposed to oral or customary law; or regulatory law promulgated by the executive or common law of the judiciary. Statutes may originate with national, state leg ...
and in other sources. To conclusively abolish the office, all mention of the governor-generalship would need to be removed from these and others also. In May 1937 de Valera introduced the ''Executive Powers (Consequential Provisions) Act, 1937'' to do that.
The Act had three main aims:
# to confer power exercisable by the King in any law in effect before 12 December 1936 to be exercisable by the Executive Committee after that date;
# to retrospectively resolve constitutional and legal problems that the removal of the office from the constitution in December 1936 had created, notably
#* the installation of the Chief Justice of the Irish Supreme Court, who had been legally required to make a declaration of office in front the governor-general, but did not do so on the (unfounded) basis that the office had ceased to exist. The installation had not complied with existing statute law and was thus invalid. The recent ''Courts of Justice Act'' (which had established a new installation procedure) was equally invalid.
#* the installation of three judges of the Supreme Court, all of whom made their declarations of office in front of the (invalidly installed) new Chief Justice, were equally invalid.
#* the installation of a new Attorney-General was also invalid since it was in breach of the requirement of the '' Ministers and Secretaries Act 1924'' that only the governor-general could appoint him.
#The granting of a pension to the 'former' governor-general,
Domhnall Ua Buachalla
Domhnall Ua Buachalla (; en, Daniel Richard "Donal" Buckley; 3 February 1866 – 30 October 1963) was an Irish politician and member of the First Dáil who served as third and final governor-general of the Irish Free State and later served as ...
. This was invalid since the post remained legally in existence.
The media and the opposition focused exclusively on the issue of the pension and failed to draw the public's attention to the fact that the new Bill was re-abolishing an office that de Valera had told them he had already abolished. By focusing on the pension (as he had hoped) the opposition failed to make capital out of one of de Valera's most dramatic and potentially humiliating mis-judgments, his first failed attempt to abolish the office of governor-general.