Fourth Amendment of The Constitution of Ireland - Overview

Overview

The Fourth Amendment altered Article 16 which deals with elections to Dáil Éireann (the lower house of parliament). However other provisions of the constitution state that anyone entitled to vote in Dáil elections is also entitled to participate in the election of the President and in referendums, so the amendment affected these votes as well. (The Ninth Amendment later diverged the two franchises.) The amendment did not, nonetheless, affect the minimum age at which one could be elected to the Dáil, and this remained at twenty-one. Although the changes shown above are those made to the English language version of the constitution, constitutionally it is the Irish text that has precedence.

The amendment was introduced by the Fianna Fáil government of Jack Lynch but was supported by every major political party. It was submitted to a referendum on the same day as the Fifth Amendment, which removed from the constitution reference to the "special position" of the Catholic Church and recognition of certain other named denominations. The Fourth Amendment was approved by 724,836 (84.6%) in favour and 131,514 (15.4%) against.