BELFAST, Northern Ireland — Northern Ireland's legislature, shut down for more than three years, sprang back to life today as a first step toward forming a Roman Catholic-Protestant administration, the elusive goal of the Good Friday peace accord eight years ago.

But assembly members took their seats inside the Stormont Parliamentary Building for barely an hour before adjourning for the day.

Power-sharing was supposed to form the centerpiece of a new, conciliatory Northern Ireland. But the last four-party administration collapsed in October 2002 over an Irish Republican Army spying scandal.

The British government emphasized today it will dissolve the assembly for good if both sides cannot come together by a Nov. 24 deadline.