Alexander Henderson (1861 - 1940)
	
Alexander Henderson was born in Oshawa, Canada West and was raised as a devout Presbyterian. He studied metaphysics, logic, and political science at the University of Toronto. He was a talented athlete and competed with the Canadian rifle team.((Linda Johnson, //At the Heart of Gold: The Yukon Commissioner’s Office 1898 – 2010.// Yukon Government, 2012: 30-31.)) He studied law and was called to the Ontario bar in 1889 and the British Columbia bar in 1892. He was elected a member of British Columbia’s Legislature for New Westminster in 1898. Henderson was named Kings Council in 1899 and was a court judge in Vancouver from 1901 to 1907. He was Commissioner of the Yukon between June 1907 and July 1911 and presided over the first wholly elected Yukon Council.((“Alexander Henderson.” Yukon Government, Commissioner of Yukon 2018 website: http://www.commissioner.gov.yk.ca/about/Alexander_Henderson.html)) His first announcement after taking office closed the Dawson dancehalls.((David Morrison, //The Politics of The Yukon Territory, 1898-1909.// Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1968: 84.))
	
The 1908 amendments to the Yukon Act created a fully elected Yukon Council but there was no link between the legislative and executive functions so the Commission had full executive powers, controlled all government employees, and was only responsible to the Department of the Interior in Ottawa. The Yukon Council could pass bills, but the Commissioner could disallow them. The Commissioners’ Residence opened again in the summer of 1908 and Henderson’s family took up residence. In the spring of 1911, Henderson threatened to dissolve the Council if they did not pass the supply bill which enabled the government to pay its civil servants. Henderson announced his retirement soon after the bill passed.((Linda Johnson, //At the Heart of Gold: The Yukon Commissioner’s Office 1898 – 2010.// Yukon Government, 2012: 34-36.))