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 in the ensuing plebiscite; the legislature passed the "Prohibition Act" in the spring of 1916. As Attorney-General, Cross was responsible for enforcing it.