Monarchy in Alberta

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Queen in Right of Alberta
Monarchy
Provincial/State
Incumbent: Elizabeth II Queen of Canada
Style:	Her Majesty
First monarch:	Edward VII
Formation:	September 1, 1905

The Monarchy in Alberta is a legal entity formally known as the Crown in Right of Alberta, which serves as the institution from which the power of the state flows within the province of Alberta, forming the core of the province's Westminster system of constitutional monarchy. The present Canadian monarch is Queen Elizabeth II, since February 6, 1952, who is known within Alberta's legal jurisdiction as the Queen in Right of Alberta. As the monarch does not reside in Alberta, a vice-regal representative, the Lieutenant Governor of Alberta, is appointed to carry out all the monarch's duties in the province.

The Crown in Right of Alberta was established with the Alberta Act, 1905, though the governments of the previous incarnations of the province, going back to the establishment of the Northwest Territories in 1870, have been monarchical in nature, and historical links with the French and British Crowns extend back even further, to the mid 1600s.

[edit] Constitutional monarchy in Alberta

The Queen of Canada (centre) with her vice-regal representative, the Lieutenant Governor of Alberta, Norman Kwong (left), and her Albertan premier, Ralph Klein (right), at the official celebrations of Alberta's centenary, May 23, 2005.

Within the Canadian constitutional monarchy system the headship of state is not a part of either the federal or provincial jurisdictions^{[citation needed]}; the Queen reigns impartially over the country as a whole. However, due to Canada's federal nature, each province in Canada, as with the federal government, derives its authority and sovereignty directly from the one Canadian monarch, meaning there effectively exists within the country eleven legally distinct crowns with one sovereign.^{[citation needed]} Thus, Alberta has a separate government headed by the Queen; however, as a province, Alberta is not itself a monarchy.

A lieutenant governor is appointed by the Governor General, on the advice of the Prime Minister of Canada, to serve as the Queen's representative in the province, carrying out all the monarch's constitutional and ceremonial duties of state on her behalf. His Honour The Honourable Norman Kwong is the current Lieutenant Governor of Alberta, having served since January 20, 2005.

The viceroy is provided with an official residence, office, and entertainment venue by the Crown. These structures and spaces belong to the Crown; they are held in trust for future rulers, and cannot be sold by the monarch. However, monarchs have owned certain homes in a private capacity: King Edward VIII owned Bedingfield Ranch, near Pekisko, High River.

The Crown in Right of Alberta performs a vast number of functions and duties central to the provincial government, judicial system, and system of honours, as well as owning provincial Crown corporations and Crown Land.

Further information: Monarchy in the Canadian provinces

[edit] Symbols

Images of St. Edward's, the Tudor, and King's Crown are visible on on provincial symbols such as police badges and the Alberta Order of Excellence, the latter illustrating the monarch's place as the ceremonial head of the Canadian honours system. Portraits of the monarch are often found in government buildings, schools, and military installations. The Crown is also included on the Lieutenant Governor's personal flag, or vice-regal standard, visible above the shield of the Arms of Her Majesty in Right of Alberta, which, in turn, is surrounded by ten gold maple leaves, symbolizing the ten provinces.

Monuments to members of the Royal Family are located across the province.

Further information: National symbols of Canada, Canadian royal symbols, and Flags of the Lieutenant Governors of Canada

[edit] Royal presence

Main article: Royal tours of Canada

Members of the Royal Family have been visiting Alberta since before the province joined Confederation, either as a royal tour, a vice-regal tour, or as a "working visit" (meaning in association with a charity or military organization instead of a state affair). Queen Elizabeth II has travelled to Alberta more than any other member of the Royal Family, touring all parts of the province from Lethbridge to Grande Prairie.

[edit] History

The Hudson's Bay Company (HBC), founded by Royal Charter issued by King Charles II in 1670, was granted by the King as a trading monopoly over the watershed of all rivers and streams flowing into Hudson Bay. This area, which included present day Alberta, was called Rupert's Land, named for Prince Rupert of the Rhine. The HBC established Fort Vermilion in what is now the north of Alberta, in 1788, making it the oldest European settlement in the province.

George H. V. Bulyea, the first vice-regal representative of the Crown in Alberta.

By 1870, HBC's monopoly over Rupert's Land was abolished, and the company ceded all the territories to the Dominion Crown through the Rupert's Land Act, 1868. Thenceforth, the area was known as the Northwest Territories (NWT), and was administered by a Lieutenant Governor. To police this new territory, the North West Mounted Police was created, and headquartered in Fort Macleod. This organization would later become the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

The area of Alberta emerged as a district within the NWT, known as the Alberta Provisional District. The governor general, the Marquess of Lorne, chose the name "Alberta" to honour Princess Louise Caroline Alberta, fourth daughter of Queen Victoria.^[1] After gaining increasing autonomy from the territorial government, and with the aid of Premier Sir Frederick Haultain, the province of Alberta was created by Royal Proclamation issued by Governor General Earl Grey on September 5, 1905. Reporting to the King on the events of the day, the Governor General said in a telegram: "[the province] a new leaf in Your Majesty's Maple Crown."^[2]

As part of their cross-country tour, King George VI and his consort Queen Elizabeth visited Alberta by train. When the royal couple arrived in Edmonton, the regular population of 90,000 more than doubled to 200,000, as Albertans from surrounding towns came in to catch sight of the King and Queen.^[3] The visit came two years after the province's Lieutenant Governor, John C. Bowen, refused to grant Royal Assent to three bills passed during William Aberhart's Social Credit government; he felt two of the bills would have interfered in federally controlled financial areas, while the third, the Accurate News and Information Act, would have placed restrictions on how media reported the news and was thus considered unconstitutional.^[4]

At the time of Queen Elizabeth II's Golden Jubilee in 2002, the Government of Alberta introduced a number of events and initiatives for the occasion. More than 4,000 Albertans attended the Lieutenant Governor's Jubilee Levée on June 23, where Lois Hole stated: "what we want to realize is how important the monarchy is to Canada and certainly to Alberta."^[5]

[edit] Royal connections

The entrance to the Royal Tyrrell Museum.

Alberta's monarchical status is illustrated via associations between the Crown and many private organizations within the province, as well as through royal names applied to a plethora of regions, communities, schools, buildings, and monuments, many of which may also have a specific history with a member or members of the Royal Family.

[edit] Communities

The Crown's presence at the most local levels is demonstrated in part by royal and vice-regal namesakes chosen to be incorporated by communities across the province. Communities with royally or vice-regally associated named include:

[edit] Education

At various levels of education within Alberta there exist a number of scholarships and academic awards either established by or named for members of the Royal Family. In commemoration of Elizabeth II's Golden Jubilee as Queen of Canada in 2002, the government of Alberta instituted the Queen's Golden Jubilee Scholarships for the Visual and Performing Arts, through the Queen Elizabeth II Golden Jubilee Recognition Act.^[5] Three years later, when the Queen returned to Alberta for the province's centenary, the Queen Elizabeth II Graduate Scholarship Program was instituted to assist any Canadian citizens or permanent residents enrolled in a master or doctoral program at an Alberta university.^[8] At the same time, the Ministry of Learning encouraged teachers to focus education on the monarchy and to organize field trips for their students to see the Queen and Prince or to watch the events on television.^[9]

Schools across the province are also named for Canadian sovereigns, royal family members, or either federal or provincial viceroys.

[edit] Landmarks

Prince of Wales Hotel, 2002.

A number of buildings, monuments and geographic locations are named for Canadian monarchs, members of the Royal Family, or federal or provincial viceroys.

Some places of historical interest include Fort Victoria, which was founded by the Hudson's Bay Company in 1864 and named for Queen Victoria; it is today a historical museum. Another structure is the Prince of Wales Hotel, located in Waterton Lakes National Park; a chalet style hotel named for Prince Edward, Prince of Wales, in 1927. Other recreational facilities, public in nature, include the Queen Elizabeth Pool in Edmonton, the first municipal swimming pool in western Canada; opened in 1922 as the South Side Pool, the bath was located in Riverside Park. The pool was renamed after Queen Elizabeth to commemorate her royal visit to the city in 1939; the park was later renamed Queen Elizabeth Park.^[10]

Lac Cardinal Provincial Park was renamed to Queen Elizabeth Provincial Park in 1978, to mark the monarch's visit to the province in that year.^[11] and, marking another visit by the sovereign in 2005, the Calgary to Edmonton length of Highway 2 was named the Queen Elizabeth II Highway. Other geographic elements are Mount Willingdon, named for former Governor General Freeman Freeman-Thomas, 1st Marquess of Willingdon,^[12] and the peak named Princess Margaret Mountain after Princess Margaret, who visited Banff and stayed near the mountain. Nearby in the Rockies is Lake Louise, named, along with the adjacent town of the same name, for Princess Louise, vice-regal consort of Governor General John Campbell, 9th Duke of Argyll.

Health care facilities also bear the names of royals, such as the Queen Elizabeth II Hospital in Grande Prairie.^[13]

[edit] Royal designation, charter and patronage

Organizations in Alberta may be founded by a Royal Charter, receive a "royal" prefix, and/or be honoured with the patronage of a member of the Royal Family.

Further information: Monarchy in the Canadian provinces: Royal designation, charter and patronage

[edit] See also

• Monarchy
• Federation
• The Canadian Crown and First Nations, Inuit and Métis
• Debate on the monarchy in Canada
• Symbols of Alberta

[edit] External links

• The Monarchy in Alberta: Teacher and Student Resource
• Queen's Printer
• 2005 Royal Visit to Alberta
• Alberta Tourism, Parks, Recreation and Culture: Provincial Archives of Alberta: Royal Visits - Film and Video Sources
• Office of the Lieutenant Governor of Manitoba

[edit] References