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Ireland’s about to take women out of its Constitution

6-3-2024 < Attack the System 40 142 words
 

Published March 5, 2024, 8:25 p.m. ET


Irish voters are heading to the polls on International Women’s Day — Friday — to remove the words “woman” and “mother” from the Constitution.


Also up for vote: a measure that would widely expand the definition of “family.”


Two amendments are on the ballot: Article 39, on the family, and Article 40, on the role of women/mothers in society.


Article 39 would redefine the family to a grouping “founded on marriage,” as the Constitution now says, “or on other durable relationships.”


The proponents of the changes argue the current wording is exclusionary to single-parent and nonmarried households.


“The relationship that exists between a child and their mother or father when they’re born, that’s the one-parent family,” Prime Minister Leo Varadkar has said. “It’s committed, it’s caring, it’s long-lasting.”


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