Whence came the Moral Law in Freemasonry?

Without a doubt at the foundation of Masonry is the idea of the Moral Law.  Anderson uses the phrase in his Constitution in 1723 without any explanation of what exactly he means in his phrasing of it.  And, increasingly, it is being used as a de facto totem of decision making in violation litigation and jurisdictional disputes.  But in the modern civic age where criminal, civil, federal, and state (and lets not even get into international) laws abound we have in many ways lost sight (if ever we had a clear one) of what exactly the ideas were behind the linking of the “Moral Laws” to the fraternity.  The source is ancient without a doubt, and most likely a challenge to come to any consensus over.  Is the Moral Law from a religious perspective, as in given to man by the Great Architect, or a man made law constructed with religious ideas but applied in a humanistic manner so as to apply to our interaction with one another.  And then, how does it apply to Masonry?  Is it a religious injunction or an instruction for how to behave?

At the root are the question then is what the Moral Law is and what is its purpose to be invoked in any decision making.

The first step to see it at the time when it was adopted by Freemasonry is to trace the idea though the ages, and its clear that the idea of a moral law has been around for some time.  Before we get to these first steps, however, perhaps we should explore what exactly the moral law is.

From Wikipedia, Natural Law is defined as:

Natural law or the law of nature (Latin: lex naturalis) has been described as a law whose content is set by nature and that therefore has validity everywhere. As classically used, natural law refers to the use of reason to analyze human nature and deduce binding rules of moral behavior. The phrase natural law is opposed to the positive law (meaning “man-made law”, not “good law”; cf. posit) of a given political community, society, or nation-state, and thus can function as a standard by which to criticize that law. In natural law jurisprudence, on the other hand, the content of positive law cannot be known without some reference to the natural law (or something like it). Used in this way, natural law can be invoked to criticize decisions about the statutes, but less so to criticize the law itself. Some use natural law synonymously with natural justice or natural right (Latin ius naturale), although most contemporary political and legal theorists separate the two.

It likens the essence of the U.S. Constitution and the Declaration of Independence to the ideas of the Natural Law, something any American reading should be intimately familiar with.

To better encapsulate the idea of the Moral or Natural Law, we need to borrow from the ideas of Thomas Hobbes (a late philosopher who codified it into modern times) who says of the Natural Law that it is “a precept, or general rule, found out by reason, by which a man is forbidden to do that which is destructive of his life, or takes away the means of preserving the same; and to omit that by which he thinks it may best be preserved.” Hobbes breaks the Natural Law down to 19 points which he illustrated in his work Leviathan.

Those 19 Laws are:

1. The first Law of nature is that every man ought to endeavour peace, as far as he has hope of obtaining it; and when he cannot obtain it, that he may seek and use all helps and advantages of war.
2. The second Law of nature is that a man be willing, when others are so too, as far forth, as for peace, and defence of himself he shall think it necessary, to lay down this right to all things; and be contented with so much liberty against other men, as he would allow other men against himself.
3. The third Law is that men perform their covenants made. In this law of nature consisteth the fountain and original of justice… when a covenant is made, then to break it is unjust and the definition of injustice is no other than the not performance of covenant. And whatsoever is not unjust is just.
4. The fourth Law is that a man which receiveth benefit from another of mere grace, endeavour that he which giveth it, have no reasonable cause to repent him of his good will. Breach of this law is called ingratitude.
5. The fifth Law is complaisance: that every man strive to accommodate himself to the rest. The observers of this law may be called sociable; the contrary, stubborn, insociable, froward, intractable.
6. The sixth Law is that upon caution of the future time, a man ought to pardon the offences past of them that repenting, desire it.
7. The seventh Law is that in revenges, men look not at the greatness of the evil past, but the greatness of the good to follow.
8. The eighth Law is that no man by deed, word, countenance, or gesture, declare hatred or contempt of another. The breach of which law is commonly called contumely.
9. The ninth Law is that every man acknowledge another for his equal by nature. The breach of this precept is pride.
10. The tenth law is that at the entrance into the conditions of peace, no man require to reserve to himself any right, which he is not content should be reserved to every one of the rest. The breach of this precept is arrogance, and observers of the precept are called modest.
11. The eleventh law is that if a man be trusted to judge between man and man, that he deal equally between them.
12. The twelfth law is that such things as cannot be divided, be enjoyed in common, if it can be; and if the quantity of the thing permit, without stint; otherwise proportionably to the number of them that have right.
13. The thirteenth law is the entire right, or else…the first possession (in the case of alternating use), of a thing that can neither be divided nor enjoyed in common should be determined by lottery.
14. The fourteenth law is that those things which cannot be enjoyed in common, nor divided, ought to be adjudged to the first possessor; and in some cases to the first born, as acquired by lot.
15. The fifteenth law is that all men that mediate peace be allowed safe conduct.
16. The sixteenth law is that they that are at controversie, submit their Right to the judgement of an Arbitrator.
17. The seventeenth law is that no man is a fit Arbitrator in his own cause.
18. The eighteenth law is that no man should serve as a judge in a case if greater profit, or honour, or pleasure apparently ariseth [for him] out of the victory of one party, than of the other.
19. The nineteenth law is that in a disagreement of fact, the judge should not give more weight to the testimony of one party than another, and absent other evidence, should give credit to the testimony of other witnesses.

Interestingly, we can turn to a religious perspective, coming specifically from a Catholic perspective; where the Natural/Moral Law is applied when the exterior actions of the actor reflect their interior motives as their source.  It links the theological virtues to the Law citing Thomas Aquinas in saying that lacking the Cardinal virtues of Prudence, Justice, Temperance, and Fortitude and the theological virtues of Faith, Hope, and Charity, that a moral choice is impossible. (See Aquinas Ethicus: or, the Moral Teaching of St. Thomas. A Translation of the Principal Portions of the Second part of the Summa Theologica)

From Wikipedia:

According to Aquinas, to lack any of these virtues is to lack the ability to make a moral choice. For example, consider a man who possesses the virtues of justice, prudence, and fortitude, yet lacks temperance. Due to his lack of self control and desire for pleasure, despite his good intentions, he will find himself swaying from the moral path.

To fully appreciate this, we must first look to Romans 2:14 when Paul of Tarsis, speaking of the Gentiles says: Even Gentiles, who do not have God’s written law, show that they know his law when they instinctively obey it, even without having heard it. Interesting to note, this  is something Pike picks up on in his exploration of the 10th degree of Scottish Rite Masonry as he points to the tenants of the “old primitive faiths.”

One has to wonder how this foundational statement from the church became the basis of the Moral Law in Masonry.  It does seem a natural fit – the Cardinal and Theological virtues in conjunction to the other ideas beginning to take shape, but it seems that they were naturally woven in as reasons for being, rather than the basis of the Natural Law.

Anderson in his Constitutions of 1723, says in item I:

A Mason is oblig’d by his Tenure, to obey the moral law; and if he rightly understands the Art, he will never be a stupid Atheist nor an irreligious Libertine.  is speaking to something else, which I suggest is towards John Locke’s idea of the Moral Law.

A statement, you’ll note, devoid of linkage to the Cardinal and Theological Virtues.  Anderson’s idea of a Moral Law came from somewhere, but where?

Perhaps it can be traced back to the time of the Roman Philosopher Cicero whose contribution to the idea was to suggest that:

“…natural law obliges us to contribute to the general good of the larger society.  The purpose of positive laws is to provide for “the safety of citizens, the preservation of states, and the tranquility and happiness of human life.” In this view, “wicked and unjust statutes” are “anything but ‘laws,” because “in the very definition of the term ‘law’ there inheres the idea and principle of choosing what is just and true.” Further that “the virtues which we ought to cultivate, always tend to our own happiness, and that the best means of promoting them consists in living with men in that perfect union and charity which are cemented by mutual benefits.”

But, to see the Moral Law in a contemporary context, we must look to John Locke, for several reasons, and not just his ideas philosophy.

Locke’s point of the Moral Law was to say “the nature of the world is governed by laws and so too is man’s conduct, and that without moral laws, men would not have society; without moral law, trust between men would collapse.”

Locke’s concept of the Moral Law was a re-working of Hobbes ideas, saying instead that people could justifiably overthrow the existing state and create a new one if the ruler went against natural law.

Though in a constituted commonwealth, standing upon its own basis, and acting according to its own nature, that is, acting for the preservation of the community, there can be but one supreme power, which is the legislative, to which all the rest are and must be subordinate; yet the legislative being only a fiduciary power to act for certain ends, there remains still “in the people a supreme power to remove or alter the legislative,” when they find the legislative act contrary to the trust reposed in them: for all power given with trust for the attaining an end, being limited by that end: whenever that end is manifestly neglected or opposed, the trust must necessarily be forfeited, and the power devolve into the hands of those that gave it, who may place it anew where they shall think best for their safety and security.

The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy says of Locke’s idea:

“…sense experience proclaims the existence of a supreme law maker, a wise creator or the world, which has made man for a purpose. Man thus has purposes – to contemplate and to procure and preserve his life. Yet the moral law cannot be garnered from consent – from mass or democratic agreement, for the voice of the people is as likely to lead to fallacies and evil. Men’s actual morality may be highly relative, but differences do not undermine the existence of commonalties in the law, hence we should not obey (or follow) others blindly. Nonetheless, the conservative Locke continues to argue that we ought to obey our lawmakers as possessing rightful power over creation, but our obedience should not just be out of fear for the lawmaker’s power, but conscientiously too: we ought to obey it because the magistrate should request morally right action.”

Locke, formerly a firm believer in the Platonic idea of a good captain steering the ship, came to the idea of leadership having a limit to the extent that he perceived as authority’s reach which we can see when he says “…it cannot be supposed the people should give any one or more of their fellow men an authority over them for any other purpose than their own preservation, or extend the limits of their jurisdiction beyond the limits of this life.”

This is important in that Its been posited that Locke was a Freemason, and that perhaps it was his ideas of the Moral Law, especially as they pertained to governance and leadership, pertained to Freemasonry too.

In a paper presented by by W.Bro. Ronald Paul Ng titled THE AGE OF ENLIGHTENMENT AND FREEMASONRY, Br. Ng asks and then answers:

“Was Locke a mason? The answer is probably yes. There is an entry on the “Leland Manuscript” in Albert Mackey’s “Encyclopedia of Freemasonry” in which he quoted a passage by the famous Dr. Oliver in the Freemasons’ Quart. Review, 1840, p 10, where Dr. Oliver said, “… this great philosopher [Locke] was actually residing at Oates, the country-seat of Sir Francis Masham, at the time when the paper [Leland Manuscript] is dated; and shortly afterwards he went up to town, where he was initiated into Masonry. These facts are fully proved by Locke’s Letters to Mr. Molyneux, dated March 30 and July2, 1696”.

In his essay, Br. Ng talks on several levels about how Locke’s ideas may have permeated into the Freemasons, including religious toleration and the process of learning by experience.  But, in this context, did Locke’s ides of a Moral Law follow him also into the Lodge, if not in letter then in spirit?

It seems that in a combination stroke of both the religious and humanist application, one which at the time they were adopted they were likely blurred lines of between, the two were combined into the ideals and principals of Freemasonry.  The Cardinal Virtues and the Theological Virtues tempered into the ideals of a Moral Law to give a fairness in action and faith.  Both the application of How to be Good Men, and in the principals of getting along in a society, come into play now in issues of recognition, jurisprudence, and internal governance and the source of the Moral Law has to be of consideration in some way when acting in a way that invokes a Moral Law as the basis of the decision.  Is it as Hobbes set down, remodeled by Locke, or is it in the manner of Paul of Tarsis in speaking of the faith of the Gentiles?  Or, is it in a more oblique Catholic manner in applying the Cardinal and Theological virtues, something unmistakable to every Mason in his perception.  Further still, is it something older and less tangible like the ideas of Cicero in that the Natural Laws are laws that cannot in fact be laws, because to be so, they invalidate there very natural state if looked at as such?

What stands out in greatest resonance with Masonry is Cicero’s remark “the virtues which we ought to cultivate, always tend to our own happiness, and that the best means of promoting them consists in living with men in that perfect union and charity which are cemented by mutual benefits.” which seem to best build the foundation of Hobbes and Locke to identify the Moral Law in Freemasonry and giving us a place to then make decisions from – perfect union and charity…cemented by mutual benefits.

Why did you join?

I had the pleasure to meet a elderly gentleman today who was a neighbor of a family member of mine. He was a very polite fellow, with a good measure of mirth and authority, tempered only by a touch difficulty to hear. In the conversation he dropped that he was 78, but you’d never guess it with the way he handled himself in his yard work.

The conversation started, after a quick exchange of pleasantries, with the innocent question to me of “Who was the Mason?” He had obviously noticed the bold square and compass on the back of my car, and it had intrigued him enough to ask about it.

I replied to him with the short reply that “I was so taken”, something any in the know brother should key in to, but I realized in just a few seconds that he wasn’t so taken, and I replied the it was me, with the elevator speech prepping to roll off my tongue, only to have him interrupt me.

“My dad was a Mason” he said with a fond gleam in his eye. “Yeah, he was a 22nd, or 32nd or something…” “I used to know the handshakes, something he told me never to throw out there, or someone would really lay into me”. I smiled to myself as he said it.

“Yeah, I have his Bible inside”.

“A Blue Masonic Bible?” I asked.

“Yeah, a big one, it was his grand-dads before him, and so on…” he trailed off, wistful again.

“I have all his things from the Masons, I’ve wanted to put into a shadow box for years” he said with a near tone of excitement. “His rings, pins, books, and lots of papers” again with a fond look in his eye.

“He had showed me all of it when I was 5, and he treated it with such reverence.” I could tell he was looking back in time. “I remember it like it was yesterday….” His yesterday trailed off for a few seconds, which I jumped on the memory to ask the question looming over us like a tree.

“So how come you never joined?” It felt like a lead weight on a line being thrown at his feet, but I had to ask.

“Oh, he dropped hints several times over the years, even inviting me to join, but I never took him up on it.” He said sounding almost regretful of the missed opportunities of the path that could of been. “I liked to ride motorcycles and hung with a rough crowd, not the kinds that were the Masons I knew. The Masons were all really good guys, and I didn’t think they would like me hanging with the crowds I ran with.”

“Its funny you should say that,” I said, “there are a lot of guys in the fraternity, including those that have bike clubs.”

“Oh I know, it just wasn’t in my cards to do it I suppose, but I have the fondest memories of my dad being in it.” he trailed off, and turned the conversation to the yard work and other mundane aspects of life.

Besides the obvious pleasure at the conversation, the exchange came to me at a time when I was asking the Great Architect some challenging questions: about life, about the fraternity, and my place in it, and its future. I know the last thing on the list is something bigger than any one person can answer, but its always been a burning question for me as I consider it in the face of my sons who I hope to one day join its ranks.

But what the conversation left me to think about, as I resumed the path of the rest of my day, was rather than simply consider why others would want to join, to take a few minutes and ask myself why did I join? Why did I become a Freemason and did it live up to those expectations? What could I do to make it that way?  I’ve personalized it of course, but its a question we can all ask of ourselves.  Why did I join Freemasonry?

The man who I had the conversation with didn’t join for what ever reasons, but his father did, and his father’s father did, and they probably had a hope that this, now elderly, gentleman would too.  But, he didn’t for what ever reasons he had at the time.  His progenitors are not here to ask why they joined, but we can ask ourselves that question.

So why did you decide to join?

5 Famous (or infamous) Freemasons

Masons like to acknowledge its notable membership.

We are constantly reminded of the super stars of Famous Freemasons which include George Washington, Ben Franklin, Mark Twain, John Wayne, and Buzz Aldrin just to name a few.  But, Freemasonry stretches much deeper into the soil of Americana and besides the heavy-weights there are many less well known brothers; the un-sung Famous or infamous members of the Ancient and Honorable Fraternity.

Before we meet these distant Masonic relatives, we need to remind ourselves that it was not their gentle association with the fraternity that predicated their particular place in history.  No, rather that is the product of their serendipity, morals and ethics, their natural skills and talent, their inspirational calling, and personal character.  The man makes the history, not his affiliations. What ever their place in history, their presence still represents an aspect of our many fraternal facets – for better or for worse.

Witness to history Abraham Zapruder

The Russian born American manufacturer of women’s clothing was the only person to document the horrific assassination of U.S. President John F. Kennedy as his motorcade passed through Dealey Plaza, in Dallas, Texas on November 22, 1963 which has since come to be the well known as the Zapruder Film.

At the age of 15 Zapruder’s Russian-Jewish family immigrated to the US leaving a 1920′s Civil War torn Russia.  Having only four years of formal education, Zapruder settled in Brooklyn, New York, where he studied English and worked as a pattern maker.  He later moved to Dallas in 1941 eventually founding a clothing manufacturing company, whose offices were directly across the street from the Texas Book Depository.

Saying of the event he bore witness to in a WFAA Dallas/Fort Worth television interview in 1963:

I got out in, uh, about a half-hour earlier to get a good spot to shoot some pictures. And I found a spot, one of these concrete blocks they have down near that park, near the underpass. And I got on top there, there was another girl from my office, she was right behind me. And as I was shooting, as the President was coming down from Houston Street making his turn, it was about a half-way down there, I heard a shot, and he slumped to the side, like this. Then I heard another shot or two, I couldn’t say it was one or two, and I saw his head practically open up [places fingers of right hand to right side of head in a narrow cone, over his right ear], all blood and everything, and I kept on shooting. That’s about all, I’m just sick, I can’t…

Zapruder passed in 1970 in Dallas.

Congressmen Charles Rangel

The prominent Democrat, and former chairmen of the House Ways and Means Committee, has been a United States House of Representatives member since 1971, representing the Fifteenth Congressional District of New York, and is the most senior member of that state’s congressional delegation. He is the founding member of the Congressional Black Caucus and a decorated Bronze Star and Purple Heart veteran of the Korean War.

Born and raised in Harlem, he entered the service of the Army where he led a group of soldiers out of a deadly Chinese Army encirclement during the Battle of Kunu-ri in 1950.  Following the war, he graduated from New York University in 1957 and St. John’s University School of Law in 1960, working as a private lawyer, Assistant U.S. Attorney, and legal counsel during the early-mid 1960s. He later served two terms in the New York State Assembly from 1967 to 1970, and then was elected to the House of Representatives.

In recent years Rangel was faced with a series of allegations of ethics violations which culminated in July, 2010, where Rangel was charged with 13 counts of violating House rules and federal laws, to which he will face a formal trial in the House to determine his fate.

Congressman Charles Rangel is a member of Joppa Lodge No. 55, in New York

Entrepreneur James Cash Penney a.k.a- J.C. Penney

Born September 16, 1875, J.C. Penney was an entrepreneur who founded the J.C. Penney’s stores in 1902 after working for four years in a small chain called the Golden Rule stores.  With an offer of partnership, Penney invested $2000 and opened a store in Kemmerer, Wyoming, with two additional stores in 1907, when be bought out his interest partnership in all three stores.  By 1920, Penney had opened 120 stores and by 1929 he had opened 1400.  In 1940, in a visit to a Des Moines, Iowa, store where he trained a Sam Walton on how to wrap packages, the founder of Wal-Mart.

With the onset of the Great Depression, Penney was beset by financial ruin but met store expenses by borrowing against his life-insurance policies.  He recovered from the financial setbacks but at the expense of his health, to give generously to a number of charities, eventually founding the James C. Penny foundation in 1954, later to be merged into the Oakland, California based Common Counsel Foundation, which partners with families and individual donors to expand philanthropic resources for progressive social movements.

Penney received his degrees in Wasatch Lodge No. 1, Salt Lake City, Utah, April 28, May 19, and June 2, 1911. Buried at Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx, New York Penney passed February 12, 1971.

Inventor John Gorrie

This little known father of modern Air Conditioning was a man of many talents, including physician, scientist, inventor, and humanitarian, and the inventor of refrigeration, is also a man who suffered for what he believed in.

Born October 3, 1803 on the isle of Nevis in the Caribbean Sea, John Gorrie grew up in South Carolina, moving to the port city of Apalachicola in Florida in 1833.  Being very active in his community, he was resident physician at two hospitals, and at various times a council member, Postmaster, President of the Pensacola’s Apalachicola Branch Bank, founding vestrymen of Trinity Episcopal Church, and served on the founding committee of the Masonic Lodge in 1835, where he was appointed secretary pro-tem on December 28, 1835, later serving as treasurer.

Of his invention, following a Malaria epidemic in 1841, Gorrie resigned from all his civic responsibilities, lowered his patient load, and dedicated his time to the illness.  Malaria, it was speculated, was from the rapid decomposition of vegetation and the hot humid air which created a poisonous gas.  Gorrie, in addressing these issues, surmised that by filling in the low lying areas and draining swamps would be a way to combat the problem.  His second prong to the cure was to develop a means to control his patient’s body temperature and the humidity in their rooms by the introduction of hanging ice above the sick beds.

Ice at that time came by boat from northern lakes which were both inconvenient and expensive.  To tackle the problem, Gorrie invented a machine in 1845 to cool air sufficiently to create ice, a patient to which was granted him in 1851.  His device (a model of which is on display in Gorrie museum) compressed air in a chamber which then released it to expand rapidly, causing it to absorb the heat from water that surrounded the chamber drawing enough heat away from the water to bring the water temperature down below freezing creating ice.

Despite the significance of his development Gorrie never made a penny from his invention.  Instead he and his invention were denounced by Northern Newspapers and he was ridiculed his efforts. This was followed by a strong lobby against him by northern ice suppliers, who monopolized the ice market and feared lost profits. Gorrie fell into financial ruin when he was sued for unpaid debts and the unexpected passing of his only investor having never provided the funds to commercialize the invention.

Falling into a nervous breakdown, Gorrie passed at the age of 54 on June 16, 1855.  Modern air conditioning is still based largely on the principals discovered by Gorrie today, and was not re-discovered until 1902 by Willis Haviland Carrier.

Programmer Steve Wozniak

Born August 11, 1950, this co-founder of Apple Computer Inc, is probably not the paragon of why to be a Freemason, but his work outside of the fraternity is every bit reason to take note of his career and accomplishments.

On the heels of selling off his and Steve Jobs possessions, the two collaborated to raise $1,300 to assemble the prototypes of what would become the Apple computer.

Formed in 1976, Apple computer went public in 1980 and made both Jobs and Wozniak multimillionaires.  After 12 year of founding his electronic empire and full-time employment with Apple, he ended his career on February 6, 1987 though he still receives a paycheck, and is a shareholder to the company.

Wozniak has since gone on to write his autobiography iWoz, and found several companies in and around electronics and technology.

Describing his impetus for joining the Freemasons, Wozniak says he joined to be able to spend more time with his, then, wife Alice (married 1976–divorced 1980).

From his book iWoz: Computer Geek to Cult Icon: How I Invented the Personal Computer, Co-Founded Apple, and Had Fun Doing It, Wozniak says about his experience with the Fraternity:

I’m not like the other people who are Freemasons.  My personality is very, very unlike theirs.  To get in, you have to say all this stuff about God, the Bible, words that sound a bit like they come from the Constitution, and none of this ritual stuff is the way I think, you know?  But I did it, and I did it well.  If I’m going to do something, I always try to do it well.  And I did this for one reason, as I said: to see Alice more.  I wanted to save the marriage.  I would go so far as to join the Freemasons if that’s what it took.  That’s how I was. P.234/235

Wozniak was initiated, passed, and raised in Charity Lodge No. 362, Campbell, CA, in 1980.

Part 3 – The Rule of Law Is Missing From Mainstream Masonry

Reviewing the manner in which Mike McCabe was treated and his Lodge was treated, it is quite evident that U.S. Mainstream Masonry has decided to rule and govern itself using a model which is a cross between the U.S. Army and the Vatican.

The Pope, or General or Grand Master of New Jersey pulled the charter of Trimble Lodge for no apparent reason other than greed. But first it asked the Lodge to vote on its fate. When 95% of the Lodge voted to remain as they were, the Grand Master said, well you didn’t vote the way I wanted you to so I am over ruling your election and taking your charter.  You are no longer a Lodge in this jurisdiction. Silly us, we thought that the process as laid out by the Constitution of the Grand Lodge of New Jersey should be binding.

Then when another Pope of New Jersey Masonry goes after McCabe he does so on trumped up charges reminiscent of Derek Gordon’s fate in Arkansas and in one of the charges uses surrogates to file a fake, false charge reminiscent of Gate City Lodge No. 2’s fate in Georgia. All along the way the Grand Master violates the tenants of his Constitution and the spirit of due process. He does so by wanton disregard of his jurisdiction’s most sacred document. Now it no longer becomes the importance of the process but the importance of the leader.

UNCONSTITUTIONALLY CHANGING A CONSTITUTION

The Grand Lodge Oligarchy in New Jersey outlawed its Constitution. You can’t insert a clause in a Constitution that says the leader can ignore any and all statues that he wants to.  By doing so you have dispensed with the necessity of having a Constitution. This seems to be the trend in modern Mainstream Masonry. The rule of law has been replaced with the cult of the leader.

But it wasn’t always this way.  In fact that is far from the tradition of Masonry. For centuries a Grand Master’s power was delineated in the Constitution which spelled out exactly when and how he could interfere in the affairs of a local Lodge.  Under the Constitution local Lodges as well as individual Brothers had rights too and spheres of influence that a Grand Lodge could not violate without permission. Just as in the civil separation of church and state we had separation of Grand Lodge and local Lodges. And Grand Masters adhered to the letter of the law.

But that has gone by the boards in today’s Masonry. And that is precisely the problem that has infected Mainstream Masonry today. Grand Lodges have become like civil governments, jealous of their power and taking extraordinary measures to keep, preserve and protect that power while constantly adding to it. In the process Grand Lodge’s have trampled on the civil rights of its members and overridden their own Constitutions which were written to limit their powers.

Instant Suspensions and Instant Expulsions without a Masonic trial by Grand Masters are not in the tradition of Masonic jurisprudence. Neither is pulling charters and closing down Lodges that are vibrant and healthy for purely political reasons. There has to be some recourse to the Brotherhood for relief from out of control Grand Masters who have eliminated all limits on their power. And that recourse has to be something beyond dumping the problem back on the individual members to correct.  If a Grand Master can over ride and negate any vote taken by the Grand Lodge acting as a body then he is as entrenched in power as Castro is in Cuba.

Here are four suggestions. Pick one, or suggest another.

1. A National Grand Lodge
2. A National Masonic Constitution and Bill of rights
3. A Congress of elected Masons in every Grand Lodge who write and interpret Masonic law
4. Abolish the Grand Lodge system altogether

The sad fact is that that the Frank Haas story in West Virginia, the story of Halcyon Lodge in Ohio,  the Gate City Lodge No.2 story in Georgia, the Derek Gordon story in Arkansas and the Mike McCabe story in New Jersey are all the same peas in a pod. And tomorrow there will be another story somewhere else, and another and another and another until American Masonry decides to reform and police itself deciding that it is an American institution not just a state body with a states rights attitude and a Confederate mindset.

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History in the making

An Historic event took place on September 11, 2010 with the cornerstone laid at the new Judicial Center in Lancaster County Virginia.

This is the first time that both The Grand Lodge of Ancient, Free & Accepted Masons of Virginia and the Most Worshipful Prince Hall Grand Lodge of Virginia Free and Accepted Masons, Incorporated who jointly performed a cornerstone laying.

Words and photos courtesy of Brother William Baumbach.

For more photos please visit the full album of the event.

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