Nineteenth Amendment of the Constitution of Ireland

The Nineteenth Amendment of the Constitution of Ireland allowed Ireland to sign the Good Friday Agreement and enabled the establishment of shared political institutions between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland.

The amendment allow the Government of Ireland to amend Articles 2 and 3 upon signing the Agreement. Prior to 1999, Articles 2 and 3 made the irredentist claim on Northern Ireland. In 1999, Articles 2 and 3 were changed to express an aspiration towards creating a united Ireland by peaceful means, while respecting the wishes of the people of Northern Ireland.

The Nineteenth Amendment was approved by referendum in 1998 (on the same day as the Eighteenth Amendment). However, Articles 2 and 3 were not changed until December 1999. This was in order to ensure that other aspects of the Belfast Agreement had been complied with first. Consequently, the Nineteenth Amendment did not itself alter Articles 2 and 3. Rather it introduced a special mechanism whereby changes to Articles 2 and 3 could be brought about at a future date by a formal declaration made by the Government.

The Nineteenth Amendment of the Constitution Act, 1998 was approved by referendum on 22 May 1998 and signed into law on 3 June of the same year. The Government declaration was made on 2 December 1999, bringing the changes to Articles 2 and 3 and certain other parts of the constitution into effect.

The Nineteenth Amendment introduced Article 29, Section 7 to the constitution. Subsections 1 and 2 are here reproduced in full. Subsection 3 is a long subsection detailing further changes to be made, both to the English and Irish language texts of the constitution, once the Government issued a formal declaration that the Belfast Agreement had come into effect. Subsection 3 is therefore too long to be fully reproduced here. The 'activating' provisions are given below while the further changes to be made to the English version of the text upon the Government's declaration are detailed further below. All of the provisions in italics were temporary and, under their own terms, were removed by the Government declaration in 1999.

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