Ireland case law explained?

ittakestwo

Below is quote of irish case law.

"This means that lawyers working in common-law jurisdictions like Ireland need to work more closely with case-law (previous cases that have come before the courts) than do lawyers operating in civil-law countries. Irish courts are bound by their previous decisions and this is known as the principle of stare-decisis"

Question I have is can a previous decision be overturned. Let's say an irish court decided on something specific 30 years ago. Could a new decision today contradict that decision or would the court be obliged to give the same decision?

Also do irish cases before independence count towards case law. Would a court decision of let's say 1914 in Belfast be relevant in a court case today on the same subject in a Dublin court?

ohnonotgmail

As far as i am aware decisions in british courts post 1914 are relevant here and are quoted by judges here when making decisions.

Samuel T. Cogley

Yes previous decisions can be overturned with good reason. Legislation can also supersede case law.

Mr. Incognito

Cases are determined on the facts. The subsequent cases can always be distinguished from earlier ones which can overturn established legal precedent up to that point

Elemonator

Yes previous decisions can be overturned. For example as societies perceptions of certain acts or beliefs changes for example homosexuality. As previous Boardsies have said, statute can also overrule case law (separation of powers comes into this) unless for example the statute is found repugnant to the Constitution.

Previous decisions of the courts pre 1914 can still be influential in areas that principles are established and are unlikely to change, like contract law principles. A lot of UK law, like Supreme Court decisions, could have some influence here since the legal systems are so similar and in cases of where a decision has never been made on a particular point of law in Ireland.

Some cases effect on precedent can be overstated as some of them would be confined to their own facts.

Both systems have their own merits, I always viewed it as a different way of developing the law. The way I see it is in civil law countries they try to legislate for everything before it happens and to have one identifiable and understandable source of law, such as France's Code de Civil. In common law countries, the law develops as courts make new decisions and it becomes precedent.

A good book on the subject would Byrne and McCutcheon on the Irish Legal System.

partyguinness

Stare decisis.

Lower courts are generally bound to follow case law from a higher court. Laterally courts will follow their own judgments.

Case law from other jurisdictions can have persuasive authority.

partyguinness

Many moons ago I graduated with a BCL and LLB in Ireland and then went to England ('Red Brick' university) for a taught LLM.

It was interesting to note that Irish case law was never once cited or even mentioned during my entire LLM course. Of course in Ireland it is the opposite, UK case law will take up a significant amount of the designated reading material on the vast majority of courses save for constitutional.

Peregrinus

partyguinness wrote: »

Many moons ago I graduated with a BCL and LLB in Ireland and then went to England ('Red Brick' university) for a taught LLM.

It was interesting to note that Irish case law was never once cited or even mentioned during my entire LLM course. Of course in Ireland it is the opposite, UK case law will take up a significant amount of the designated reading material on the vast majority of courses save for constitutional.

But it's England & Wales that is the exception here, rather than Ireland. Precedents from other jurisdications are invoked relatively rarely in England & Wales, whereas in most other common law jurisdictions foreign precedents are routinely cited, many of them from England & Wales.

The other exception is the US, where citation of US (federal and state) precedents is routine, and citation of foreign precedents much rarer.

The explanation is fairly straightforward; the US and England & Wales are two of the largest and oldest common-law jurisdictions, each with a vast body of existing domestic predecents. They don't have to look further afield to find relevant precedents for most questions that come before them, and of course domestic precedents, if not actually binding, are generally more persuasive than foreign precedents.

Claw Hammer

The House of lords aka the Privy Council now the Supreme Court hear appeals from all over the world as well as domestic cases. This is a multi judge court hearing appeals from multi judge courts. Until recently the Irish Supreme Court was the only multi judge court in Ireland with the exception of the court of criminal appeal and a divisional court of the High Court, something which was very rare. Even Irish text books are confined to quoting a single judgement of the Irish High Court as an authority for propositions of law.
It is very easy to distinguish a single decision and future judges of the High Court are not bound if they think it is wrong.
The result of that is than and English court is going to put very little weight on a High Court of Ireland decision and it is unlikely that the judgement would even be opened to an English Court. It would be rare for an irish court to be first to hit upon a point of law that has not been decided before given the volume of litigation in Irish Courts.
An example can be seen here
http://www.cearta.ie/2015/06/full-breach-damages-in-data-protection-cases-the-impact-of-vidal-hall-on-collins-v-fbd/

partyguinness

Peregrinus wrote: »

But it's England & Wales that is the exception here, rather than Ireland. Precedents from other jurisdications are invoked relatively rarely in England & Wales, whereas in most other common law jurisdictions foreign precedents are routinely cited, many of them from England & Wales.

The other exception is the US, where citation of US (federal and state) precedents is routine, and citation of foreign precedents much rarer.

The explanation is fairly straightforward; the US and England & Wales are two of the largest and oldest common-law jurisdictions, each with a vast body of existing domestic predecents. They don't have to look further afield to find relevant precedents for most questions that come before them, and of course domestic precedents, if not actually binding, are generally more persuasive than foreign precedents.

I am aware of the reasons and I wasn't looking for an explanation. As I said, it is an interesting point of note. Well IMO anyway.

GM228

Claw Hammer wrote: »

The House of lords aka the Privy Council now the Supreme Court hear appeals from all over the world as well as domestic cases. This is a multi judge court hearing appeals from multi judge courts.

The UK SC hears cases from all over the world?

Edit: Yes you are correct, see my post #15.

partyguinness

GM228 wrote: »

The UK SC hears cases from all over the world?

I imagine the poster meant British Crown Dependencies from all over the world.

GM228

partyguinness wrote: »

I imagine the poster meant British Crown Dependencies from all over the world.

I think the poster actually meant cases from all over the world are cited in support of arguements made, they can hold a persuasive value.

The UK SC only "hears" appeals from England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

Grolschevik

GM228 wrote: »

I think the poster actually meant cases from all over the world are cited in support of arguements made, they can hold a persuasive value.

The UK SC only "hears" appeals from England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

I imagine this is what's being alluded to:

In their capacity on the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council (JCPC), all eleven of the Supreme Court’s justices hear cases from a number of Commonwealth countries, plus UK overseas territories, crown dependencies and military sovereign base areas. These countries include the Bahamas, Bermuda, Jamaica and Saint Lucia.

https://www.legalcheek.com/2017/02/uk-supreme-court-justices-are-hearing-death-penalty-cases/

GM228

Grolschevik wrote: »

I imagine this is what's being alluded to:



https://www.legalcheek.com/2017/02/uk-supreme-court-justices-are-hearing-death-penalty-cases/

Ah yes now I see what the poster meant, the poster stated the SC heard the cases.

Whilst the SC judges may sit the court, it is the JCPC and not the SC who hears the cases, actually come to think of it they can and do sit jointly as a single body - something which has only happened in the last few years so yes the poster is indeed correct, my apologies, but they are still technically separate courts, the JCPC being 176 years older than the SC.

Claw Hammer

The name or style of the court is not relevant to the point i was making. the issue is the volume and number of cases mean that there is almost invariably a home grown judgment for a UK court to look at on any issue that arises before it so there is rarely a need to look at other jurisdictions and even when other jurisdictions are looked at, Ireland is a small bit player.