The North-West Mounted Police were cerated in 1873 specifically to ensure that Canadian administration and settlement of the newly acquired North-West Territories were carried out in a peaceful and orderly manner. They did so with a remarkable degree of success. Contacts between the white and Indian societies were peaceful, and crime and violence amond settlers remained under control at all times. becasue of their efficiency and popularity with the public, the Mounted Police were able to make the transition from policing the frontier to maintaining law and order in a settled and developed community.
R.C. Macleod traces the evolution of the force and also investigates why it was so successful. He finds both structural and sociological reasons. The North-West Mounted Police had advantages not enjoyed by similar organizations elsewhere in the world. Its officers exercised extensive judicial powers; indeed, for its first decade or so of existence, the force carried out virtually all functions of government in the Territories. Sociologically, the elite nature of the force -- it attracted a consistently competent group of men and officers -- and public acceptance of the high social standing of its members freed them from the pressures of local opinion and power.
Above all, the NWMP was not an ailen imposition, but a genuine expression of the society it served. Its members played so large a part in the creation of western Canadian society that by the time their original assignment was complete they were an important part of the way in which that society defined itself, and hence indispensable to it.

Rod Macleod, Professor Emeritus, was professor of History and Classics at the University of Alberta from 1969 until he retired in 2005. During his tenure he served as Chair of the Department of History and later as Associate Dean of Arts. He has written extensively on the history of Western Canada as well as Canadian legal and military history. His books include The Mounties and Prairie Fire: The 1885 North West Rebellion as well as The North West Mounted Police and Law Enforcement 1873-1905. Rod is the official historian for the University of Alberta. In that capacity he researched and wrote All True Things: A History of the University of Alberta, 1908 – 2008, published by the University of Alberta Press. He served two terms as the Alberta representative on the Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada. Rod Macleod lives in Edmonton.

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