“What is this adventitious strange power?”: Sources for Teacher Privilege and Schoolchildren’s Rights in 20th-Century Ireland

In this article, Mathew Staunton sets out to expose the roots of the increasingly controversial privilege of Irish teachers to physically correct the schoolchildren in their charge in ways which would constitute battery in other contexts. Under-analysed and only very superficially explained in Ireland, the legal sources of this “strange” power do not appear to be fixed and flit like flies between Ancient Rome, 13th-century Italy, 18th-century England, and 1930s Ireland. This can only be convincingly presented (in the form of a legal fiction) if the general public can be prevented from looking too closely at what is going on behind the curtain. Focusing on the interaction between the natural law, the common law and Bunreacht na hÉireann, Staunton will shed light on the fuzzy legal framework for teacher behaviour in 20th-century Ireland.