Irish vote on Church’s status

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 33094, 8 December 1972, Page 13

Irish vote on Church’s status

(N.Z.P. A.-Reuter—Copyright)

DUBLIN, December 7.

The people of the Irish Republic, voting in a national referendum today, are widely expected to approve a Government plan to end the special status of the Roman Catholic Church.

The Government scheme is aimed at convincing Protestants in British-ruled . Northern Ireland that any evenual union with the re- ■ public would not mean Roman Catholic primacy. The move is supported by : the Republic’s three main political parties and most of the Roman Catholic Church hierarchy. The Government’s main fear is that a low turnout in the referendum would be regarded by Northern Ireland Protestants as an indication that the people of the republic do not really want integration. The Prime Minister (Mr Jack Lynch) has issued an appeal for the people to go to

the polls and said that he would regard a turn-out of between 65 and 70 per cent as satisfactory. Some 1,800,000 people over the age of 21 are eligible to vote. They will be asked to approve both a change in the 1937 Constitution on the special position of the Roman Catholic Church and to support the lowering of the voting age to 18. Mr Lynch, himself a strong practising Roman Catholic, has linked voter participation with the drive to defend “democratic institutions against subversion”—an apparent reference to his tough new laws against the guerrilla Irish Republican Army.