Under the Government of Ireland Act, 1920, which forms, with some slight amendments, the written constitution of Northern Ireland, power was given to the province to set up a separate record office for itself. When the transfer of services to Northern Ireland took place, no steps were at first taken to establish such an office, although circumstances would soon have necessitated the consideration of such a course. Local departments and minor courts contained an accumulation of documents which were aged over twenty years from the date of making, and therefore, according to a statutory provision, fit for transfer to the central repository. Partly from the disturbance of customary routine due to war conditions, partly from motives of prudence owing to the disturbed state of the country, which rendered transport unsafe, these documents had for some time not been transferred to Dublin. The destruction of the Four Courts in June 1922—which involved the loss of the Irish records and the specially equipped building in which they had been preserved—entailed the consequence that there was no longer in existence a repository suitable for the receipt of Northern Ireland records, even supposing that such would be sent out of the province in the altered situation. By an act of 1923, the northern government set up its own record office.