candidates in those, in Edmonton they gave Cross a somewhat bumpier ride. The Calgary Albertan, in an editorial advocating the return of Liberal candidates in all five by-elections, criticized Cross as "disloyal to [Sifton] in the beginning, and doubtless will be to the end." The Edmonton Bulletin, still owned by Oliver, complained that while in the other four by-elections voters were being asked to judge Sifton's government, in Edmonton it appeared that they were being asked to judge Rutherford's. Cross defeated his main opponent, Conservative Albert Ewing, but by a much smaller margin than he had managed in 1905 and 1909. Ewing claimed electoral fraud and appealed the outcome to the courts, but the 1913 election pre-empted his appeal. In that election, perhaps recalling the narrowness of his by-election win, Cross ran in two ridings, Edmonton and Edson. He won both (Ewing was the second victor from the two-member Edmonton district), making him the only person in Alberta history to represent two constituencies at the same time (though not the only one to try: Sifton also did so in 1913, and Boyle would in 1921). The Edmonton contest was a close contest and only after several recounts was Cross declared a winner. Prohibition was gaining currency in Alberta: the Conservatives had included it in their 1913 platform, and it was supported by the increasingly powerful United Farmers of Alberta (UFA). The government generally opposed the idea, and Cross held up Manitoba as example of its failures. But the government had also (at the UFA's behest) introduced direct democracy measures, one of which allowed citizens to initiate plebiscites. The well-organized temperance movement did so on prohibition, which was endorsed by a majority of voters in the ensuing plebiscite; the legislature passed the Prohibition Act in the spring of 1916. As Attorney-General, Cross was responsible for enforcing it. Conscription and the Stewart cabinet In 1917, the Alberta Liberal Party, held delicately together since 1910, burst once again into conflict with the conscription crisis. The Conservative federal government of Robert Borden supported imposing conscription to help win World War I, and most of English Canada supported him. The Liberal leader, Wilfrid Laurier, opposed conscription, but many of the party's English-speaking members supported it and defected to a Borden-led Union government. This dispute had repercussions in the Alberta party: Sifton supported conscription, and shortly after winning the 1917 election (in which Cross was re-elected