The Executive

The structure of the Executive provides the most original feature of the Irish Constitution. In it there is an attempt to combine the “ responsibility” of the Cabinet system with that continuity of policy and permanence of personnel secured by a non-parliamentary Executive. The Executive Council provides the motive force in the political life of the Free State. Government is to a remarkable extent the government of the Executive. The structure of the Executive is that of a constitutional monarchy. Its essence is that of a Republic. This divergence between the form and the substance of constitutional machinery was necessitated by the Free State’s acceptance of Dominion status. The framework of the modern Cabinet system involves the existence of a supreme and permanent symbol of authority in whose name Executive functions are performed. The official communiqué expressly stated that the Governor-General was appointed on the advice tendered to the Crown by the President of the Executive Council.