In the 1980s in Ireland a period came about that has been dubbed the 'moral civil wars'. As Ireland during that time was still very heavily influenced by the Catholic Church, the people of Ireland were more conservative then they are now. During the 1980's, the government drew attention to moral issues such as contraception, abortion and divorce. These moral issues are of course very important concerns for a growing society, but unfortunately at that time they overshadowed important welfare problems. Ireland was experiencing a huge recession at the time, meaning rising unemployment, poverty and outward migration. .
Contraception was a very controversial topic in Ireland in the 1980's. The catholic church bans all modern contraception, abstinence being the only accepted form. Contraception was legalised on the 1st November, 1980. However there were still a lot of restrictions. The pro-life campaign in 1983 was a huge issue in Ireland at that time. The pro-life amendment campaign was backed by Fianna Fail. The campaigning for this referendum was very strong on both sides, including one person pouring a bucket of pigs blood over a couple of campaigners. A pro-life campaigner Loretto Brown saw the what she called 'anti-life' campaign as a mix of Capitalism and Marxism. She said "that capitalism and Marxism are united in the fight for abortion on demand; the one for money, the other for ideological reasons." (Muldowney, 2013: 43).
When the referendum was held in 1983, it passed in favour of the pro-life campaign. Some of the campaigners however were still not happy at the amendment as they thought it could open doors for abortion being legalised in the future. Currently in Ireland abortion is still illegal except under special circumstances and even then the case has to be seen by a panel. The Divorce Referendum was held in 1986. This was a strong moral issue at the time and the issues brought up in campaigning during that referendum are being brought up again this time around for the marriage equality referendum.
