In the United States, we have this idea of westward expansion, across the Great Plains into the territory stolen from Native American peoples and won or purchased from European powers. Did Canada have this same idea of a western frontier and westward expansion? Did they have an "old West" up north? Or was the idea of the borderland fundamentally different?
Well yes. The North-West Mounted Police (later the RCMP/GRC) was founded in part as a response to the lawlessness on Canada's western frontier. Whiskey traders ran illegal and lawless trading posts, the most infamous being named "Fort Whoop-Up" Many of the traders were American, and reports that some were flying the American flag provided additional impetus to the formation of the RCMP in order to preserve Canadian sovereignty over the area.
The arrival of the NWMP on The Great March West did tend to put an end to the lawlessness. Some were expecting a pitched battles with the whiskey traders, but most if not all fled before the arrival of the Mounties. The presence of a regional police force was pretty effective at controlling the lawlessness. Though there most still have been some lawbreaking to give rise the RCMP's reputation of "always getting their man."