The Criminal Law and Procedure (Ireland) Act 1887 (50 & 51 Vict. c. 20) was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom which amended the

criminal law Criminal law is the body of law that relates to crime. It prescribes conduct perceived as threatening, harmful, or otherwise endangering to the property, health, safety, and moral welfare of people inclusive of one's self. Most criminal law i ...

in Ireland to give greater law enforcement power to the authorities. It was introduced by Arthur Balfour, then

Chief Secretary for Ireland The Chief Secretary for Ireland was a key political office in the British administration in Ireland. Nominally subordinate to the Lord Lieutenant, and officially the "Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant", from the early 19th century un ...

, to deal with the Plan of Campaign, an increase in illegal activity associated with the Land War. It was informally called the Crimes Act, Irish Crimes Act, or Perpetual Crimes Act; (the last because it was permanent, unlike earlier

Crimes Act {{Use dmy dates, date=April 2022 Crimes Act (with its variations) is a stock short title used for legislation in Australia, New Zealand and the United States, relating to the criminal law (including both substantive and procedural aspects of that l ...

s passed as

emergency measures An emergency is an urgent, unexpected, and usually dangerous situation that poses an immediate risk to health, life, property, or environment and requires immediate action. Most emergencies require urgent intervention to prevent a worsening ...

with limited duration) or the Jubilee Coercion Act (being passed in the year of the

Golden Jubilee of Queen Victoria The Golden Jubilee of Queen Victoria was celebrated on 20 and 21 June 1887 to mark the 50th anniversary of Queen Victoria's accession on 20 June 1837. It was celebrated with a Thanksgiving Service at Westminster Abbey, and a banquet to which ...

Implementation

The act empowered the

Lord Lieutenant of Ireland Lord Lieutenant of Ireland (), or more formally Lieutenant General and General Governor of Ireland, was the title of the chief governor of Ireland from the Williamite Wars of 1690 until the Partition of Ireland in 1922. This spanned the Kingdo ...

by proclamation to name a district within which the act would have force. The other provisions applied only with such "proclaimed areas". The act allowed actions connected to agrarian violence to be tried as

summary offence A summary offence or petty offence is a violation in some common law jurisdictions that can be proceeded against summarily, without the right to a jury trial and/or indictment (required for an indictable offence). Canada In Canada, summary offenc ...

s by a magistrate without a jury. The "

Mitchelstown Massacre Mitchelstown () is a town in County Cork, Ireland with a population of approximately 3,740. Mitchelstown is situated in the valley to the south of the Galtee Mountains, 12 km south-west of the Mitchelstown Caves, 28 km from Cahir, 50& ...

" occurred on 9 September 1887, when Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) members fired at a crowd protesting against the conviction under the act of two men, including MP William O'Brien. Three were killed; when Balfour defended the RIC in the Commons, O'Brien dubbed him "Bloody Balfour". On 6 May 1920, as the

Irish War of Independence The Irish War of Independence () or Anglo-Irish War was a guerrilla war fought in Ireland from 1919 to 1921 between the Irish Republican Army (IRA, the army of the Irish Republic) and British forces: the British Army, along with the quasi-mil ...

was escalating, it was reported to the Commons that "Between 1st November, 1918, and 30th April, 1920, 305 cases were dealt with under the Criminal Law and Procedure (Ireland) Act. 1,109 persons were prosecuted in these cases, 454 were convicted, 109 were discharged, 352 were ordered to find bail, 194 are awaiting trial." The act empowered the Lord Lieutenant to proclaim associations to be "dangerous" and to prohibit them. Under this power, the Irish National League was banned on 19 August 1887; likewise the First Dáil on 10 September 1919; Sinn Féin, the Irish Volunteers, Cumann na mBan, and the Gaelic League were proclaimed dangerous on 3 July 1918, and banned in various counties between June and October 1919.

Repeal

Bills to repeal the act were introduced regularly by Irish nationalist MPs. In 1907, Michael Hogan proposed a motion in the Commons that, "in the opinion of this House, the presence of the Criminal Law and Procedure (Ireland) Act on the Statute Book is a gross violation of

the Constitution A constitution is the aggregate of fundamental principles or established precedents that constitute the legal basis of a polity, organisation or other type of entity and commonly determine how that entity is to be governed. When these pri ...

, without parallel in any other portion of His Majesty's dominions, and that the Act should be immediately repealed." It was supported on behalf of the government by

Augustine Birrell Augustine Birrell King's Counsel, KC (19 January 185020 November 1933) was a British Liberal Party (UK), Liberal Party politician, who was Chief Secretary for Ireland from 1907 to 1916. In this post, he was praised for enabling tenant farmers t ...

, the newly appointed Chief Secretary for Ireland, and passed by 252 votes to 83. A 1908 repeal bill passed second reading and committee stage in the Commons. The act was repealed in the Republic of Ireland by the Statute Law Revision Act 1983. In the United Kingdom (as regards Northern Ireland) the act was partially repealed by the

Northern Ireland (Emergency Provisions) Act 1973 The Northern Ireland (Emergency Provisions) Act 1973 is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom which abolished the death penalty for murder in Northern Ireland, and established the Diplock courts in which terrorist offences were tried by ...

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