Leinster House
Leinster House (Irish Teach Laighean ) is the former ducal palace in Dublin, where since 1922 the Parliament of the Irish Republic (then Irish Free State ) in session. Until 1922, the Leinster House meeting of the Royal Dublin Society. The Dublin Spring Show and the Horse Market (Dublin Horse Show ) were held on the premises of the house towards Merrion Square.
In the late 18th century was the Leinster House ( the then called Kildare House), the official city residence of the Earl of Kildare (namely, the family of the Fitzgeralds ). He had it from 1745 to 1748 - on purpose - " easier " on the south side of the river built, the remaining nobility houses in the northern part (especially on Parnell Square and Mountjoy Square ) had while in town. As the Earl had foreseen, were south in the following decades of Merrion Square and Fitzwilliam Square of the River Liffey to the preferred residential area of the aristocracy, who sold most of its northerly houses which ultimately degenerated and ended up as slums.
No other aristocratic building in Dublin was able to keep up with the Leinster House in terms of size and facilities. When the Earl the title Duke of Leinster was, the house was given its present name. The first two floors of Leinster House served as a template for the floors and the house itself for the stone exterior of the White House in Washington, DC.
Due to the Act of Union Dublin lost its own parliament and many aristocrats sold their homes in the city to move to London. Then sold to the Duke of Leinster Leinster House to the Royal Dublin Society. Towards the end of the 19th century, two new wings were added to accommodate the National Library of Ireland and the National Museum of Ireland.
The Treaty Anglo -Irish Ireland was given another official own government, the Irish Free State. The provisional government under W.T. Cosgrave now sought a temporary meeting place, where were held the assemblies of Upper and Lower House. Initial plans for saw the Royal Hospital Kilmainham in the district before, but this was still under the rule of the British Army. Since the withdrawal of the army was not within the available time of a few weeks realized it was decided in December 1922 to temporarily rent the auditorium of the Royal Dublin Society Lecture in Leinster House for the meeting of the House.
In 1924, the plan to rebuild the Royal Hospital into a parliament building, abandoned because of financial problems. Instead, Leinster House was purchased, which should be developed in the future. The Senate (upper house ) was placed in the ballroom and used another wing of the neighboring Royal College of Science ( Dublin) as a government building. The rest of the building of the Royal College of Science in 1990 - at that time it was already merged with the University College Dublin - completely taken over and converted into a modern government buildings. Both the National Library and the National Museum are still in the wings of Leinster House, which are not connected to the government complex. Although there have been plans to build a new parliament building (eg in the Phoenix Park or the Custom House ), the government has remained until today in Leinster House.
In 2000 further additions were completed to ensure the now 166 members of the lower house, the 60 Senate members, the press and other personnel suitable office space.
A number of monuments is (or was ) around Leinster House. The front of the Kildare Street was originally dominated by a large statue of Queen Victoria, which was built in 1904. The statue was removed in 1947 and built in the 1990s in Sydney again. On the side facing the Merrion Square is a triangular monument with three main characters of Irish Independence: Arthur Griffith, Michael Collins and Kevin O'Higgins. Another statue honoring Prince Albert, husband of Queen Victoria, who held his large Irish exhibition in the 1850s on the estate.