Chamber of Deputies

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Chamber of deputies is the name given to a legislative body such as the lower house of a bicameral legislature, or can refer to a unicameral legislature.

Description

Historically, France's "Chamber of Deputies" was the lower house of the French Parliament during the Bourbon Restoration, the July Monarchy, and the French Third Republic; the name is still informally used for the National Assembly under the nation's current Fifth Republic.

The term "chamber of deputies" — although it was used as the name of the lower house of parliament in Burma, a former British colony — is not widely used by English-speaking countries, the more popular equivalent being "House of Representatives". It was also the official description of Dáil Éireann (the lower house of the Irish parliament) during the period of the Irish Free State.

In Malta, the House of Representatives is known, in Maltese, as "Kamra tad-Deputati". In Lebanon, the literal Arabic name of that country's parliament is Majlis an-Nuwwab, or, "Chamber of Deputies" (although officially used French and English translations are "Assemblée Nationale" and "National Assembly", respectively).

A member of a "chamber of deputies" is generally called a "deputy", the definition of which is similar to that of "congressperson" or "member of parliament". The term "deputy" may be used to refer to any member of a legislative body or chamber; this usage is particularly common in those French- and Spanish-speaking countries whose parliaments or legislative chambers refer to themselves as "national assemblies"; the term is also used by Portugal's Assembly of the Republic, and often in Ireland as a form of address when referring to members of Dáil Éireann.^[1][2]

Lower house in bicameral legislature

In the following countries, the Chamber of Deputies is the name of the lower house of the bicameral legislature.

Unicameral legislatures

In the following countries, 'Chamber of Deputies' is the name given to the unicameral parliaments :

Defunct chambers of deputies

• Burma¹
• Congo-Kinshasa^1[3]
• Ecuador²
• Egypt²
• Ethiopia¹
• France¹
• Iraq¹
• Libya¹
• Nicaragua²
• Ottoman Empire
• Peru²
• Portugal¹
• Venezuela²

1. Legislature disbanded
2. New constitution, unicameral system adopted

See also

• List of national legislatures

References