Ireland Votes Overwhelmingly to Ease Divorce Restrictions
Ireland has voted overwhelmingly to ease restrictions on divorce, taking another step toward liberalizing a Constitution that was once dominated by the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church.
Official figures released this weekend showed that 82 percent of voters in referendum on Friday approved the change, with all areas of the country voting strongly in favor.
The results come on the heels of other major social shifts in the country: a 2015 vote to legalize same-sex marriage — the word’s first popular vote on marriage equality — and a referendum last year that repealed Ireland’s ban on abortion in almost all circumstances, including rape and incest.
In October, the nation voted overwhelmingly to remove a ban on blasphemy from the Constitution.
Divorce was banned in Ireland by a 1937 Constitution strongly influenced by the Catholic hierarchy, and an attempt to overturn the ban in a 1986 referendum was soundly defeated by a 3-to-2 margin.
The country made divorce legal in 1995, after a referendum deciding the issue with just over 9,000 votes of 1.63 million cast.
But the new law imposed strict conditions, including a provision that a couple must have lived apart for four of the previous five years before getting divorced.
The results of Friday’s referendum remove divorce regulations from the Constitution and place them in the hands of lawmakers.
The government of Prime Minister Leo Varadkar, having consulted with other parties, said it would move to reduce the waiting period to two years.
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