On second chambers: The Irish Free State Seanad

Continuing my look at second chambers, and following some of the comments on my post about the Senate of Northern Ireland we now turn to the rest of Ireland. I'll come to the present Seanad in my next post in this series, but first I'd like to take a look at the Seanad in the Irish Free State, now known as "1st Seanad" (with the numbering for the current Senate starting from "2nd Seanad"). (For consistency I'm using "Seanad" rather than "Senate" throughout.)

Be warned that some of this is complicated as despite only lasting fourteen years it was subject to several constitutional amendments and effectively had three different (s)election systems over six elections in its life.

Composition: Start-up: 30 members elected by Dáil Éireann, with terms of three or nine years allocated by lot. 30 members appointed by the prime minister for six or twelve year terms. These arrangements were just to get things going.

As originally envisaged for permanent running: Members would serve for twelve years, with a third (fifteen) directly elected in a state wide Single Transferable Vote election.

The nomination process was complicated to say the least. Candidates would be nominated in three sections - senators up for re-election could renominate themselves; the Seanad as a whole then selected an equal number of candidates from a list submitted; and then the Dail selected a number equal to both the renominations and Seanad selection. (See Northern Ireland Elections: "An exceedingly severe test" - The Irish Senate elections of 1925 for more details of the one election that did take place.) Interim vacancies were filled by a vote of the Seanad; however the Senator would only serve until the next set of Seanad elections. (Also candidates had to be at least 35.)

Following changes in 1928: Direct elections were done away with and terms reduced to 9 years. The Seanad was now elected by thirds, with the outgoing Seanad and the Dail jointly voting by STV. The nominations were also changed so there would now be twice as many candidates as seats, with half the candidates nominated by the Seanad and the other half by the Dail. Sitting Senators lost the automatic right to renominate themselves. (The minimum age for candidates was now reduced to 30.)

Fairness of representation: Elections on a single nationwide constituency, whether direct or indirect, cannot be subject to gerrymandering or malapportionment.

The start-up and post 1928 composition both suffer from the dangers of duplicating the lower house. The prime ministerial nominations in 1922 and the election of 1925 diluted this a bit. Having the Seanad directly involved in nominating so many candidates for itself is also a tendency towards perpetuation.

The rights of parties who opt to abstain is always contentious, but it's worth noting that the decision by the anti-Treaty rump of Sinn Féin to boycott the Dail meant that it was not represented in the Seanad either. When most of Sinn Féin left to form Fianna Fáil and took their seats in the Dail this began to be corrected, but to a large extent the conflict between the Fianna Fáil government of 1932 onwards and the Seanad was rooted in the former's unrepresentation in the upper house.

The 1925 election saw a number of candidates elected who either benefitted from a very high local turnout (compared to a low statewide turnout) or who had the support of geographically scattered groups such as ex-servicemen or publicans. Such interest groups are traditionally badly represented in constituency based parliaments.

In light of later proposals and actions regarding the modern Seanad's composition it's worth explicitly noting that there was no direct representation for either Northern Ireland or the Irish emigrants. (This is something I'll come back to when looking at the present Seanad.) However there was nothing specifically stopping a candidate from Northern Ireland being put forward.

Powers and conventions: Originally: The Seanad could only delay, not veto legislation. However it could delay a money bill for 21 days and any other bill for 270 days. The Seanad had the power to call a binding referendum on any bill if a majority requested it within seven days of passing or if 60% of Senators requested it within ninety days. (5% of registered voters could also petition for a referendum but that's outside this scope.) This didn't cover either money bills or bills declared by both houses to be "necessary for the immediate preservation of the public peace, health or safety". No referendum was called while this power existed.

From 1928: The power to call a referendum was scrapped. The power to delay ordinary bills was extended to twenty months.

Conflict resolution: As the Seanad only had the power to delay, the Dail would normally eventually triumph in a dispute. Referring a bill to the people was one alternative, although this was never exercised. (It may well have been had the Seanad still had the power once Fianna Fáil were in power.) In 1936 following protracted disputes over constitutional changes, the Seanad itself was abolished - the ultimate in conflict resolution.

Protector against the tyranny of the majority vs bastion against democracy: As noted above, the initial boycott by what became Fianna Fáil meant that they and the votes that had sent them to the Dail were underrepresented in the Seanad for a decade after they ended the boycott. Now one can quite legitimately argue that was a consequence of their own choice, but even after 1934 (when the entire Seanad had now been elected post boycott) there was still under representation stemming from the earlier boycott and the self-renewal process of the Seanad. At what point does a house stop being legitimately elected in a long period and become a hangover with an out of date mandate?

Because of the boycott it's hard to test the Seanad's effectiveness on its initial powers, but the ability to refer a bill to the people is one way to resist the partisan interests of a majority in a lower house. Post 1932 the Seanad was taking a firm stance against the Dail but was unable to prevent itself from being abolished - a short term protector at best.

Anything else?: The 1925 election is an interesting test of using STV under very extreme circumstances - electing 19 members from 76 candidates. This is even more complex than some Australian Senate elections (last time there were 78 candidates chasing 6 seats from New South Wales). One has to wonder if a 76 candidate preference ballot paper is "manageable" for the voters so that they can cast a vote that is successful in electing a member.

Anything worth copying?: Staggered elections are good, although I question if electing by a quarter isn't too long. The power to refer a bill to the people is a very good idea and one to allow for an upper house to go over the head of the fully single elected house. The post 1928 indirect elections don't fill me with much excitement though as such a system can make it very hard for a total renewal to take place and have some Senators with a very tenuous link to the votes that elected those who originally directly elected them. Also I don't think it wise to have a lower house involved in selecting any part of its own upper house.

On second chambers: The Senate of Northern Ireland

To kick off this look at second chambers around the world past and present, let's look at the one other that has existed in the United Kingdom, the Senate of Northern Ireland which existed between 1921 and 1972.

As a brief disclaimer, I'm going to avoid wider issues such as gerrymandering, and the local government franchise. Whilst they were definitely part of the Stormont regime (although some of the gerrymandering originated at local level, though later reinforced by the Stormont government), they were not part of the Senate per se and can distort discussion of the structure.

Composition: 26 members (25 in practice from 1969). 24 elected by Single Transferable Vote by members of the Northern Ireland House of Commons with 12 elected at the start of each Parliament for two terms. The other two were the Lord Mayors of Belfast and Londonderry ex officio. In 1969 the Londonderry Corporation was suspended and no new elected body introduced before Stormont was prorogued. The Lord Mayor of Londonderry's seat was not filled.

Fairness of representation: One obvious distortion is that whilst the two county boroughs were directly represented, the six county council areas were not. (The gerrymandering of the Londonderry Corporation is widely known, but as the Mayor was elected by the councillors this point is perhaps beyond the scope of this analysis.) It's not clear at a glance if the Mayors were there to represent their cities, their councils, just the majorities on their councils or the people of the cities - four distinct (if sometimes confused) concepts. The 12 members elected at the start of each Parliament were elected by sitting members of the House of Commons. Abstenionist MPs thus did not have the opportunity to elect (abstentionist) Senators. Approximately 4 MPs were needed to elect 1 Senator, although with a sizable abstention this could reduce the quota. Micro parties in the Commons (and there were a number in the history of Stormont) would thus not be represented in the Senate unless they could band together. Consequently the 12 elected would be disproportionately representative of the larger parties in the Commons.

The precise political composition is not recorded as interest in the Senate was low but given the limited participation in the Commons by Nationalists, the fragmentation of opposition parties in the Commons and the addition of the Lord Mayors the chamber would have been even more Unionist dominated than the Commons.

The method for handling midterm vacancies isn't currently recorded on either webpage I'm linking to. Was there a convention that an opposition party with a vacancy could nominate a replacement unopposed?

Powers and conventions: I'm not too sure on these, although the Senate was regarded as "not designed to be a check on the legislature, but rather a place for reflection and revision of government bills - an additional means of finding parliamentary time" (Northern Ireland Elections: The Northern Ireland Senate, 1921-72) and in practice had virtually no political impact.

Conflict resolution: Again details are limited, especially as the Senate was never set up to be a check & balance on the Commons, whilst as both chambers were always controlled by the same party the potential for party conflict was minimal.

Protector against the tyranny of the majority vs bastion against democracy: This is rather more theoretical (especially given the limited information on powers and the lack of any reason to use them), but in terms of its composition the Senate could potentially have been a protector without being too much of a block to overwhelming changes in public opinion. As its composition reflected the outcome of two general elections it could resist a small change in opinion altering the balance of power in the Commons as at no point was even a bare majority of the Senate elected in one go. By contrast a landslide sweep of the Commons would bring with it many Senate seats and so securing a Senate majority would be possible for a new government with mass popular support. And as a government can call an election, what would there be to stop a new one calling an early election just to ensure it could get a majority in the upper house?

Because almost all the Senate was elected by the House of Commons, there was no opportunity for voters to "ticket split" and elect one party to a Commons majority and another to keep a check on them. And in any case it takes more than just composition but also actual powers for an upper house to take on the lower.

Anything else?: The Senate was created as an afterthought and it shows. Originally there would have been a single Senate for both Northern Ireland and Southern Ireland, but during the Government of Ireland Bill's passage through the Westminster Parliament this was amended to create separate Senates. (Northern Ireland Elections: The Senate of Southern Ireland, 1921) "Of course it developed into a sinecure for politicians who couldn't or wouldn't get into the lower house." (The Northern Ireland Senate. Op cit.) As early as 1926 there were calls for its abolition.

Anything worth copying?: Very little to be honest. The one point worth taking on board is the staggered elections. But having the upper house elected directly by the lower house is not particularly attractive as it primarily duplicates the lower house's composition, as well as creating opening for sinecures and placemen. And it is vulnerable to the ability of governments (or lower houses) to call a new election.

The inclusion of the two Mayors provided a link to local government, but it is a distortion of the role - Mayors are primarily chosen for civic municipal duties, not sitting in legislatures. (Executive Mayors, like the directly elected Mayors we now have in some areas, are as the name suggests executives, not legislators.) The idea of rotating mayoralties further makes it difficult to use them for a legislature as there is the risk a person will be chosen as Mayor for the sake of the legislature, not the municipality.