Viscount Haldane:-

This is an appeal from a judgment of the Supreme Court of Alberta, by which it was held that there was jurisdiction in the Court to entertain proceedings on a petition for divorce on the ground of adultery.

The Province was established in 1905 by a Dominion Act of that year, being formed out of the North-West Territories. By Section 16 of the Act it was provided that the laws previously in force in the North-West Territories included in the New Province should continue subject to certain reservations which are not material. No law relating to marriage or divorce has been enacted by the Dominion Parliament since the Province was established, and it is therefore necessary to ascertain what was the law relating to marriage and divorce in the Territories before the Province was constituted.

In the appeal, immediately previous to this one, of Walker v. Walker, their Lordships have referred to the legislation by which the Parliament of the Dominion acquired power to make laws relating to the North-West Territories. In 1886, the Dominion Parliament passed, under the powers it had so acquired, an Act to amend the law respecting them (49 Vict., c. 25). By Section 2 of that A