Established in 1926, The Royal Canadian Legion is Canada’s largest Veteran support and community service organization in Canada. It is a democratic, non-partisan. member-based organization.  There are currently over 300,000 members in over 1400 Branches across Canada.

The Legion has a formal corporate structure that qualifies Commands and Branches as non-profit organizations.  

Dominion Command

Dominion Command is in Ottawa and has supreme jurisdiction over all the Commands, Councils and Branches in Canada.  

Dominion Command created one Provincial Command in each Province.  A few Provinces, of which Alberta is one, include a Territory within the Provincial Command.  

Provincial Commands

Provincial Commands are usually referred to as "Command".

Our Provincial Command is the "Alberta-Northwest Territories Command" (AB-NWT Command).  Their office is in Calgary.

Districts

Because some Provinces, including Alberta, are so large geographically, many Provincial Commands formed "Districts" within their Commands.  

The AB-NWT Command has 9 Districts.  The Spruce Grove Legion is in District 8.  

Areas

District 8 is encompasses a large geographic area, so was then separated into 2 "Areas" ("Area A" and "Area B") but this is only for the purposes of Legion Sports (i.e. Legion Cribbage, Legion Pool, Legion Shuffleboard).  Not all Districts have Areas.

The Spruce Grove Legion is in Area A.

Branches

A Branch is formed when 50 or more people in an urban area, or 10 or more people in in any other areas (unless otherwise approved), request a Branch Charter.  They must have a pre-specified number of voting members and meet other criteria.

Provincial Command reviews the request.  If they approve it, it is forwarded to Dominion Command for review and approval.  Dominion Command grants the charters, and has the power to revoke them in specific circumstances. The Branch can also turn in it's charter if it feels it is no longer able to remain a viable and active Branch.

Each Branch has a Name and a designated Branch Number; the number is assigned chronologically so reflects the order in which the Branch charters were granted within the Provincial Command (i.e. 01 is the 1st AB-NWT Command charter that was granted, etc).  Each Province does use the same set of numbers, so the Branch Name is an important part of the Branch designation.

The Spruce Grove Legion was granted their charter on 19 September 1974. Our official designation is "Spruce Grove Branch No. 281 of the Royal Canadian Legion".

The chain of command is Member to Branch, Branch to Provincial Command, Provincial Command to Dominion Command.

EJH