Vegreville was a

provincial Provincial may refer to: Government & Administration * Provincial capitals, an administrative sub-national capital of a country * Provincial city (disambiguation) * Provincial minister (disambiguation) * Provincial Secretary, a position in Can ...

electoral district An electoral district, also known as an election district, legislative district, voting district, constituency, riding, ward, division, or (election) precinct is a subdivision of a larger state (a country, administrative region, or other polity ...

Alberta Alberta ( ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is part of Western Canada and is one of the three prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to the west, Saskatchewan to the east, the Northwest Ter ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

, mandated to return a single

member Member may refer to: * Military jury, referred to as "Members" in military jargon * Element (mathematics), an object that belongs to a mathematical set * In object-oriented programming, a member of a class ** Field (computer science), entries in ...

to the

Legislative Assembly of Alberta The Legislative Assembly of Alberta is the deliberative assembly of the province of Alberta, Canada. It sits in the Alberta Legislature Building in Edmonton. The Legislative Assembly currently has 87 members, elected first past the post from singl ...

from 1909 to 1963 and again from 1971 to 1993.

History

Boundary history

Vegreville was created from the northwest corner of the

Vermilion Vermilion (sometimes vermillion) is a color, color family, and pigment most often made, since ancient history, antiquity until the 19th century, from the powdered mineral cinnabar (a form of mercury sulfide, which is toxic) and its correspondi ...

district as part of the almost-doubling of seats in the Legislature in 1909. Over time, its boundaries were adjusted several times, shrinking to the area immediately surrounding the town of

Vegreville Vegreville ( uk, Веґревіль) is a town in central Alberta, Canada. It is on Highway 16A approximately east of Edmonton, Alberta's capital city. It was incorporated as a town in 1906, and that year also saw the founding of the ''Vegrev ...

. In 1963, Vegreville was merged with some of the

Bruce The English language name Bruce arrived in Scotland with the Normans, from the place name Brix, Manche in Normandy, France, meaning "the willowlands". Initially promulgated via the descendants of king Robert the Bruce (1274−1329), it has been a ...

district to form Vegreville-Bruce, but in the redistribution that followed, the district was renamed Vegreville with little change in boundaries. The riding was finally abolished in 1993, mostly absorbed by

Vegreville-Viking Vegreville-Viking was a provincial electoral district in Alberta, Canada, mandated to return a single member to the Legislative Assembly of Alberta from 1993 to 2004. History The Vegreville-Viking electoral district was created in the 1993 elec ...

, with a small area transferred to

Vermilion-Lloydminster Vermilion-Lloydminster was a provincial electoral district in Alberta, Canada, mandated to return a single member to the Legislative Assembly of Alberta using first past the post method of voting from 1993 to 2019. The largest communities in ...

Representation history

Vegreville (and Vegreville-Bruce) was mostly a

bellwether A bellwether is a leader or an indicator of trends.bellwether
" ''Cambridge Dictionary''. Ret ...

riding, having been held by an opposition party only once until 1982. Its first MLA was

James Bismark Holden James Bismark Holden (October 4, 1876 – April 10, 1956) was a businessman and a municipal and provincial politician from Alberta, Canada. He served as a member of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta from 1906 to 1913, sitting with the Liberal ...

, who had already served as MLA for

for the Liberals. He served one term in Vegreville and retired in 1913. His successor was

Joseph McCallum Joseph Seeley McCallum (July 9, 1884 – July 22, 1945) was a Canadian politician from Alberta. Early life Joseph Seeley McCallum was born July 9, 1884 in Renfrew, Ontario to Angus McCallum and wife Jane Seeley. His family moved to Beaver Lake, ...

, who won Vegreville for the Liberals by a much smaller margin in 1913 and 1917 but nonetheless held the district for the government. However, in 1921, he was soundly defeated by

United Farmers of Alberta The United Farmers of Alberta (UFA) is an association of Alberta farmers that has served different roles in its 100-year history – as a lobby group, a successful political party, and as a farm-supply retail chain. As a political party, it forme ...

candidate

Archie Matheson Archibald Malcolm (Archie) Matheson was a Canadian politician who represented Vegreville in the Legislative Assembly of Alberta from 1921 until 1935. He was elected in the 1921 election and re-elected in 1926 and 1930 as a member of the Unite ...

in their party's rise to power. Matheson was a vocal backbencher in the UFA government, opposing his own government's stances on prohibition and eugenics, and aggressively advocating for local interests during his three terms. However, Matheson was in turn soundly defeated by

Social Credit Social credit is a distributive philosophy of political economy developed by C. H. Douglas. Douglas attributed economic downturns to discrepancies between the cost of goods and the compensation of the workers who made them. To combat what he ...

candidate James McPherson when the UFA was swept out of power in 1935, placing third in the first round of voting. McPherson served only one term. In 1940, Social Credit held the seat with candidate

George Woytkiw George Woytkiw (July 5, 1903 – August 31, 1956) was a provincial politician from Alberta, Canada. He served as a member of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta for only two months in 1940. He sat as a Social Credit member from the constituen ...

winning on the second round. Matheson ran in this election as well in an attempt to re-take the seat, this time as a CCF candidate, but placed third again. Woytkiw also served only one term, but Social Credit candidate Michael Ponich held the seat again in 1944, despite a strong challenge by the CCF. Ponich won again in a landslide in 1948, but faced another close race in 1952. In 1955

Stanley Ruzycki Stanley Nicholas Ruzycki (December 31, 1915 – October 15, 2004) was a politician from Alberta, Canada. He served in the Legislative Assembly of Alberta from 1955 to 1959 as one of two members of the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation cauc ...

defeated Ponich in the second round of voting to take the seat for the

Co-Operative Commonwealth Federation The Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (CCF; french: Fédération du Commonwealth Coopératif, FCC); from 1955 the Social Democratic Party of Canada (''french: Parti social démocratique du Canada''), was a federal democratic socialism, democra ...

. In response, the Social Credit government abolished

instant-runoff voting Instant-runoff voting (IRV) is a type of ranked preferential voting method. It uses a majority voting rule in single-winner elections where there are more than two candidates. It is commonly referred to as ranked-choice voting (RCV) in the Un ...

in rural ridings and introduced

first past the post In a first-past-the-post electoral system (FPTP or FPP), formally called single-member plurality voting (SMP) when used in single-member districts or informally choose-one voting in contrast to ranked voting, or score voting, voters cast their ...

voting across the province. Ruzycki was subsequently defeated by Social Credit candidate Alex Gordey in 1959. After Gordey's first term, Vegreville was merged with

, and he chose to run again in the new riding of Vegreville-Bruce. He served two terms there, and Vegreville was reinstated in 1971. Running again in Vegreville, Gordey would be defeated along with

Harry Strom Harry Edwin Strom (July 7, 1914 – October 2, 1984) was the ninth premier of Alberta, from 1968 to 1971. His two-and-a-half years as Premier were the last of the thirty-six-year Social Credit dynasty, as his defeat by Peter Lougheed saw its r ...

's government by the Progressive Conservatives. John Batiuk won the seat by a significant margin, and went on to serve four terms, becoming the longest-serving MLA in the district's history. When Batiuk chose not to run again in 1986, the open seat was picked up by

New Democrat New Democrats, also known as centrist Democrats, Clinton Democrats, or moderate Democrats, are a centrist ideological faction within the Democratic Party in the United States. As the Third Way faction of the party, they are seen as culturall ...

Derek Fox. He served two terms until the riding was abolished in 1993, and was defeated by future premier

Ed Stelmach Edward Michael Stelmach (; born May 11, 1951) is a Canadian politician and served as the 13th premier of Alberta, from 2006 to 2011. The grandson of Ukrainian immigrants, Stelmach was born and raised on a farm near Lamont and fluently speaks ...

in the new riding of

. As of 2016, Fox is the last Alberta New Democrat to have held a rural seat for two successive terms.

Election results

1900s

1910s

1920s

For the 1926 election, the United Farmers government introduced

alternative vote Instant-runoff voting (IRV) is a type of Ranked voting, ranked preferential Electoral system, voting method. It uses a Majority rule, majority voting rule in single-winner elections where there are more than two candidates. It is commonly referr ...

in rural constituencies. Three counts were necessary in Vegreville, as Matheson failed to win a majority on the first or second round. , - !colspan=6, Second count , colspan=2, Neither , align=486 ''Final round swing represents gain from the first round. Overall swing is calculated from first preferences.''

1930s

''The source records a second count between McPherson and Gordon despite McPherson's majority result. This may be the result of an archiving error.''

1940s

, - !colspan=6, Second count , colspan=2, Neither , align=230 , - !colspan=6, Second count , colspan=2, Neither , align=417

1950s

, - !colspan=6, Second count , colspan=2, Neither , align=648 , - !colspan=6, Second count , colspan=2, Neither , align=395 After the 1955 election, the Social Credit government abolished

in rural districts and reintroduced

. Vegreville was therefore won without a majority on the first round in 1959, and this change can also be seen in the dramatic drop in spoiled (incorrectly marked) ballots.

1971 general election

1975 general election

1979 general election

1982 general election

1986 general election

1989 general election

Plebiscite results

1957 liquor plebiscite

On October 30, 1957 a stand-alone plebiscite was held province wide in all 50 of the then current provincial electoral districts in

. The government decided to consult Alberta voters to decide on liquor sales and mixed drinking after a divisive debate in the Legislature. The plebiscite was intended to deal with the growing demand for reforming antiquated liquor control laws. The plebiscite was conducted in two parts. Question A asked in all districts, asked the voters if the sale of liquor should be expanded in Alberta, while Question B asked in a handful of districts within the corporate limits of Calgary and Edmonton asked if men and woman were allowed to drink together in establishments. Province wide Question A of the plebiscite passed in 33 of the 50 districts while Question B passed in all five districts. Vegreville voted in favour of the proposal by a solid majority. Voter turnout in the district was abysmal falling well under the province wide average of 46%. Official district returns were released to the public on December 31, 1957. The Social Credit government in power at the time did not considered the results binding. However the results of the vote led the government to repeal all existing liquor legislation and introduce an entirely new ''Liquor Act''. Municipal districts lying inside electoral districts that voted against the Plebiscite were designated Local Option Zones by the Alberta Liquor Control Board and considered effective dry zones, business owners that wanted a license had to petition for a binding municipal plebiscite in order to be granted a license.

References

External links

Elections AlbertaThe Legislative Assembly of Alberta
{{Coord, 53.50, N, 112.05, W, display=title Former provincial electoral districts of Alberta