Policing in Canada

The murder in Ottawa in April 1868 of Thomas D’Arcy McGee, Prime Minister Sir John A. Macdonald’s Irish lieutenant in Montreal, provided reasons for the establishment of the Dominion Police (initially fewer than a dozen men) to protect federal buildings in Ottawa and to enforce certain federal laws. Creation of the Dominion Police gave legitimacy to arrangements already in place, and established the approach to Canadian security that would persist until this force and the Royal North-West Mounted Police amalgamated in November 1919 and became the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Today, Canada has police forces at the municipal, provincial, and federal levels.