Emergency Powers Act 1939

The Emergency Powers Act 1939 is an act of the Oireachtas (Irish parliament) enacted on 3 September 1939 after an official state of emergency had been declared on 2 September 1939. The act allowed the government to:

make provisions for securing the public safety and the preservation of the state in time of war and, in particular, to make provision for the maintenance of public order and for the provision and control of supplies and services essential to the life of the community, and to provide for divers and other matters (including the charging of fees on certain licences and other documents) connected with the matters aforesaid.

The act gave the government the ability to maintain Irish neutrality during The Emergency by providing sweeping new powers to the government for the duration of the emergency, such as internment, censorship of the media and mail by postal censorship, and the government control of the economy.

During the Dáil debate on the act, Fine Gael TD, John A. Costello was highly critical of the delegation of powers, stating that,

Preparation for the emergency were well in hand a year before it was needed, because by way of the 1938 Anglo-Irish Trade Agreement, access had been acquired to the British government's second world war legal emergency preparations. The Sudetenland crisis prompted the adapting of the British "war book" for Ireland's purposes with draft legislation already finished by September 18, 1938.

According to Tony Gray, the Emergency Powers Orders, EPOs, made under the Act were so draconian that they effectively abolished democracy for the period, and most aspects of the life of the country were controlled by the dictatorial powers the government acquired. The Garda Síochána got extended power of search and arrest. Compulsory cultivation of land and compulsory queuing for buses, were a few topics for which orders were made. A total of 7,864 orders were made. One aspect of the EPOs was that once they were laid before the Oireachtas, TDs could only annul an EPO, but could not scrutinise, or amend them like they could with legislation.

Media censorship of radio broadcasts was effected by having news bulletins read to the head of the Government Information Bureau for approval before being broadcast by Radio Éireann and weather forecasts were forbidden which inconvenienced both farmers and fishermen.

The Emergency Powers Act finally lapsed on 2 September 1946. However the state of emergency itself was not rescinded until 1 September 1976.