page_title: Alberta and Great Waterways Railway scandal
hierarchical_section_title: Alberta and Great Waterways Railway scandal
caption_attribution_description: Depicted person&#58; &#32;Alexander Cameron Rutherford&#32;– Canadian lawyer and politician; first premier of Alberta
context_page_description: The Alberta and Great Waterways Railway Scandal was a political scandal in Alberta, Canada in 1910, which forced the resignation of the Liberal provincial government of Alexander Cameron Rutherford. Rutherford and his government were accused of giving loan guarantees to private interests for the construction of the Alberta and Great Waterways Railway that substantially exceeded the actual cost of construction, and which paid interest considerably above the market rate. They were also accused of exercising insufficient oversight over the railway's operations.
  The scandal split the Liberal Party: Rutherford's Minister of Public Works, William Henry Cushing, resigned from his government and publicly attacked its railway policy, and a large portion of the Liberal caucus voted to defeat the government in the Legislative Assembly of Alberta. Although the government survived all of these votes, and Rutherford largely placated the legislature by appointing a royal commission to investigate the affair, pressure from Lieutenant-Governor George Bulyea forced Rutherford's resignation and his replacement by Arthur Sifton.
context_section_description: The Alberta and Great Waterways Railway Scandal was a political scandal in Alberta, Canada in 1910, which forced the resignation of the Liberal provincial government of Alexander Cameron Rutherford.  Rutherford and his government were accused of giving loan guarantees to private interests for the construction of the Alberta and Great Waterways (A&GW) Railway that substantially exceeded the actual cost of construction, and which paid interest considerably above the market rate.  They were also accused of exercising insufficient oversight over the railway's operations.
  The scandal split the Liberal Party: Rutherford's Minister of Public Works, William Henry Cushing, resigned from his government and publicly attacked its railway policy, and a large portion of the Liberal caucus voted to defeat the government in the Legislative Assembly of Alberta.  Although the government survived all of these votes, and Rutherford largely placated the legislature by appointing a royal commission to investigate the affair, pressure from Lieutenant-Governor George Bulyea forced Rutherford's resignation and his replacement by Arthur Sifton.
  The royal commission reported months after Rutherford had already resigned.  The majority did not find Rutherford or his cabinet guilty of any wrongdoing, but criticized them for poor judgment, both in relation to the loan guarantees and in relation to the exemptions the A&GW received from provincial legislation; a minority report was more sympathetic, and declared the allegations against them "disproved".  James Cornwall, a Liberal backbencher who supported Rutherford, fared somewhat worse: his personal financial involvement in the railway gave rise to "suspicious circumstances", but he too was not proven guilty of any wrongdoing.
  Besides provoking Rutherford's resignation, the scandal opened rifts in the Liberal Party that took years to heal.  Sifton eventually smoothed over most of these divisions, but was frustrated in his railway policy by legal defeats.  He ultimately adopted a similar policy to Rutherford's, and the A&GW was eventually built by private interests using the money raised from provincial loan guarantees.  The Liberals went on to be re-elected in 1913 and 1917.
caption: Alexander Cameron Rutherford was a popular premier who enjoyed a sizeable majority before the scandal broke.
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