Government
In 1892 Edmonton was incorporated as a town. The first mayor was Matthew McCauley, who established the first school board in Edmonton and Board of Trade (later Chamber of Commerce) and a municipal police service. Due to mayor McCauley's good relationship with the federal Liberals this helped Edmonton to maintain political prominence over Strathcona, a rival settlement on the south bank of the North Saskatchewan River. Edmonton was incorporated as a city in 1904 and became the capital of Alberta in 1905.
Unions and radical organizations such as the Industrial Workers of the World struggled for progressive social change through the early years, with the first reformer, James East, being elected in 1912, followed by the first official Labour alderman, James Kinney, the following year. Many thousands of workers participated in the Edmonton general strike of 1919 and a strong block of Labour representatives were on council after the next election: James Kinney, James East, Sam McCoppen, Joe Clarke and Rice Sheppard.
Labour representation on city council would become a majority in 1929, and, during the Great Depression, from 1932 to 1934. Jan Reimer became the city's first female mayor, when she was elected in 1989.
Read more about this topic: Edmonton
Famous quotes containing the word government:
“It cannot in the opinion of His Majesty’s Government be classified as slavery in the extreme acceptance of the word without some risk of terminological inexactitude.”
—Winston Churchill (1874–1965)
“The basis of our governments being the opinion of the people, the very first object should be to keep that right; and were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)
“You and I ... are convinced of the fact that if our Government in Washington and in a majority of the States should revert to the control of those who frankly put property ahead of human beings instead of working for human beings under a system of government which recognizes property, the nation as a whole would again be in a bad situation.”
—Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945)