CHAPTER I.

gfje Mature of a ©ranir 2Lo&se*
Lenning defines a Grand Lodge to be ;' the dog- matic and administrative authority of several par- ticular Lodges of a country or province, which is usually composed of the Grand officers and of the presiding officers of these particular Lodges, or of their deputies, and which deliberates for their general good."*
The Old Charges of 1722 gave a more precise definition, and say that " the Grand Lodge consists of, and is formed by, the Masters and Wardens of all the regular particular Lodges upon record, with the Grand Master at their head, and his Deputy on his left hand, and the Grand Wardens in their proper places. "f
Both these definitions refer to an organization which is comparatively modern, and which dates its existence at a period not anterior to the beginning of the last century. Perfectly to understand the nature of a Grand Lodge, and to comprehend the
* Encyclopadie der Freimaurerei, word Orient.
f Anderson's Const, first edit. p. Gl and ante p. 68.
408 NATURE OF A GRAND LODGE,
process by which such a body has changed its character, from an aggregation of all the Masons living in a particular jurisdiction, to a representa- tive body, in which all, except a select few, have been excluded from its deliberations, we must go back to the earlier published records that we pos- sess of the history of the institution.
The duty, as well as the right of the craft, to hold an Annual Meeting, in which they might deliberate on the state of the Order, and make necessary general laws for its government, may be considered, in consequence of its antiquity and its universality, to possess all the requisites of a Landmark.
The first written notice that we have of the existence of a Grand Lodge or General Assembly of the fraternity, is contained in the old manuscript of Nicholas Stone, which Preston tells us was, with many others, destroyed in the year 1720, but of a portion of which Anderson, as well as Preston, gives a copy in the second edition of his Book of Consti- tutions.* We are there informed that about the year 293,t St. Alban, the proto-martyr of England, who was a great patron of the fraternity, obtained a charter from Carausius to permit the Masons to hold a general council, to which he gave the name
* See Anderson, second edit. p. 57. Let me here remark, that whatever may be said against the edition of Anderson, published in 1738, and which is the last that he edited, on account of the changes which it contains in the Charges of 1722, it is infinitely superior in the historical part to the first edi- tion of 1723, whose meager and unsatisfactory details have justly been the cause of much complaint.
f This is the date given by Rebold — Hist, de la Francmagon, p. 95,
NATURE OF A GRAND LODGE. 409
of Assembly, and over which he presided as Grand Master.
In consequence of the subsequent political condi- tion of England, Masonry, with the other arts and sciences, declined, and it is not probable that the annual assemblies of the fraternity were regularly maintained. About the beginning of the tenth century, however, the institution revived, and Prince Edwin, the brother* of King Athelstan, obtained from that monarch a charter for the Masons to renew their General Assembly or Grand Lodge.
Accordingly, in the year 926, says Anderson, " Prince Edwin summoned all the Free and Accepted Masons in the realm to meet him in a congregation at York, who came and formed the Grand Lodge under him as their Grand Master, "t
This was an important communication, for it was here that the Old York or Gothic Constitutions were framed — the oldest copy that is extant of a code of Masonic Regulations, and which formed the basis of all the Constitutions that were subsequently adopted.^
In these Constitutions we find the assertion of the right and duty of all the members of the craft to attend the communications of the Grand Lodge, and
* In the first edition of Anderson he is called " the youngest son," an error which was corrected in the second and subsequent editions.
t Anderson, second edit. p. 64.
i See a condensed exemplar of these Constitutions at page 42 of this work.
18
ill) NATURE OF A GRAND LODGE.
also a brief summary of the organization and func- tions of that body.*
There is one peculiarity about these Constitutions which, in passing, I desire to notice, as it is con- nected with the legal history of Grand Lodges. The Fellow Crafts were permitted to attend the General Assembly, but the Apprentices are not alluded to, because they were not, at that time, con- sidered as " men of the craft.'7
It is probable that from that time the Annual Grand Lodges continued to be held, although not with uninterrupted regularity ; for, while Masonry nourished under some of the English monarchs, under others it declined. At all events we learn from an ancient record, a copy of which is given by Anderson, that in the reign of Edward III. a Grand Lodge was held, and certain important regulations enacted for the government of the craft. This was between the years 1327 and 1377, but the exact date is not furnished by either Preston or Anderson.t
* " They ordained there an assembly to be held
Every year, wheresoever they would,
To amend errors, if any were found,
Among the craft within the land ;
Each year or third year it should be held,
In every place wheresoever they would ;
Time and place must be ordained also
In which place they should assemble ;
All the men of the craft must be there." —Gothic Constitutions, lines 471-479. I have modernized the orthography, which, without affecting the meaning, has destroyed the very little pretension that the original had to rhyme. Oliver's condensation of this " ordinance" will be found in the present work at p. 47. t Anoekson, secon4 edit. p. 71 ; Pkeston, p. 137.
NATURE OP A GRAND LODGE. 411
In 1425, these meetings still continued, for in that year, in the reign of Henry VI., Parliament passed an act to prohibit " the yearly congregations and confederacies made by Masons in their general assemblies. "*
This act was, however, we are informed, never enforced ; and we again hear of the General As- sembly as having met in 1434.
In the reign of Queen Elizabeth, on the 27th De- cember, 1561, we have an account of a Grand Lodge which was held at York — Sir Thomas Sackville being Grand Master ; and the record is singular, in- asmuch as it states two important facts, namely, that several persons were made Masons by the Grand Lodge, and that after they were made, they joined in the communication,'!' which proves that the custom still continued of admitting all members of the craft to assist in the General Assembly.
The next Grand Lodge, whose communication was of such importance as to entitle it to a place in the records of the institution, was that which was held on the 27th December, 1663, when the Earl of St. Albans was Grand Master, and when several judicious regulations were enacted .J
Erom this time General Assemblies were annually held, both at York and London, until the beginning of the eighteenth century, when, owing to the
* Anderson, second edit. p. 74 ; Preston, p. 141.
f This was the celebrated meeting to which Queen Elizabeth sent an armed force to break up the assemblage. See Anderson, second edit, p, 81, and Preston7, p. 154.
i Anderson second edit. p. 101.
412 NATURE OF A GRAND LODGE.
neglect of Sir Christopher Wren, the Grand Master, and to some other causes, the Annual Assembly, we are told, was not duly attended.*
But now we arrive at an important era in the his- tory of Masonry. In 1716, there were only four Lodges in existence in London, and no others in the whole south of England. These four Lodges deter- mined, if possible, to revive the institution from its depressed state, and accordingly they met in Febru- ary, 1717, at the Apple-tree Tavern, (whose name has thus been rendered famous for all time,) and after placing the oldest Master Mason, who was the Master of a Lodge, in the chair, they constituted themselves into a Grand Lodge, and resolved, says Preston, "to revive the quarterly communications of the fraternity." On the following St. John the Baptist's day, the Grand Lodge was duly organized, and Mr. Anthony Sayre was elected Grand Master, who " appointed his Wardens, and commanded the brethren of the four old Lodges to meet him and the Wardens quarterly in communication. "t From that time Grand Lodges have been uninterrupt- edly held, receiving, however, at different periods, various modifications, which are hereafter to be noticed.
The records from which this brief history has been derived, supply us with several facts, from which we may elicit important principles of law.
* Anderson, second edit. p. 108.
f I again quote the words of Preston, but Anderson says he commanded " tlie Masters and Wardens."
NATURE OF A GRAND LODGE. 4x3
Id the first place, we find that originally the meetings of the fraternity in their General Assembly or Grand Lodge, were always annual. The old York Constitutions, it is true, say that the assembly might be held triennially ; but wherever spoken of, in subsequent records, it is always as an Annual Meeting. It is not until 1717 that we find anything said of quarterly communications ; and the first al- lusion to these subordinate meetings in any printed work, to which we now have access, is in 1738, in the edition of the Constitutions published in that year. The expression there used is that the quar- terly communications were ': forthwith revived." This of course implies that they had previously existed ; but as no mention is made of them in the Regulations of 1663, which, on the contrary, speak expressly only of an " Annual General Assembly," I feel authorized to infer that quarterly communica- tions must have been first introduced into the Ma- sonic system after the middle of the seventeenth century. They have not the authority of antiquity, and have been very wisely discarded by nearly all the Grand Lodges in this country.
In the next place, it will be observed that at the Annual Assembly, every member of the craft was permitted to be present, and to take a part in the deliberations. But by members of the croft, in the beginning, were meant Masters and Fellows only. Apprentices were excluded, because they were not entitled to any of the privileges of craftsmen. They were not free, but bound to their Masters, and
414 NATURE OF A GRAND LODGE.
in the same position that Apprentices now arc in any of our trades or mechanical employments. The institution was then strictly operative in its charac- ter ; and although many distinguished noblemen and prelates who were not operative Masons, were, even at that early period, members of the Order and exalted to its highest offices, still the great masi of the fraternity were operative, the workmen were engaged in operative employments, and the institu- tion was governed by the laws and customs of an operative association.
In this respect, however, an important change was made, apparently about the beginning of the eighteenth century, which had a remarkable efiect on the character of the Grand Lodge organization. Preston tells us that at that time a proposition was agreed to " that the privileges of Masonry should no longer be restricted to operative Masons, but extend to men of various professions, provided they were regularly approved and initiated into the Order."* Now, as it is known that long before that period " men of various professions" had been admitted into the Order, and as we find a king presiding as Grand Master in 1502, and many noblemen, pre- lates, and distinguished statesmen occupying the same post, before and after that period.it is evident that this Regulation must be construed as meaning that the institution should throw off from that time its mixed operative and speculative character, and become entirely speculative. And we are war-
* Pkeston, p, 180.
NATURE OF A GRAND LODGE. 415
ranted in making this conclusion by the facts of history.
In 1717, and very soon after, we find such men as Anderson and Desaguliers, who were clergymen and philosophers, holding high positions and taking an active part in the Order, and the Society from that time devoted itself to the pursuit of speculative science, leaving the construction of cathedrals and palaces to the operative workmen, who, as such, were unconnected with the Order.
Now, the first effect of this change was on the character of the class of Apprentices. They were no longer, as in the olden time, youths placed under the control of Masters, to acquire the mysteries of a trade, but they were men who had been initiated into the first degree of a Mystic Association. The great object of the Apprentices in the operative art was to acquire a knowledge of that art, and being- made free by the expiration of their time of service, which the oldest Constitutions prescribed should bo seven years, to be promoted to the rank of Crafts- men, when they would be entitled to receive wages, and to have a voice in the deliberations of the Society.
The Apprentices in the speculative science but seldom proceeded further. The mass of the old Society consisted of Fellows, or Fellow Crafts ; that of the new organization was composed of Appren- tices. The primitive Lodges were made up of Fellow Crafts principally ; the modern ones of Ap- prentices. Anderson, Preston, and all the old
il6 NATURE OF A GRAND LODGE.
Charges and Constitutions will afford abundant proofs of this fact.*
The Apprentices haying thus become the main body of the fraternity, the necessary result was, that occupying, in this respect, the place formerly filled by the Fellow Crafts, they assumed all the privileges which belonged to that class. And thus we arrive at the fact, and the reason of the fact, that in 17 IT, at the re-organization of the Grand Lodge, Entered Apprentices were admitted to attend the Annual Assembly ; and we can satisfactorily appre- ciate that clause in the thirty-ninth of the Regula- tions, adopted in 1721, which says that no new regulation should be adopted until, at the Annual Assembly or Grand Feast, it was offered in writing to the perusal of all the brethren, "even of the youngest Entered Apprentice."
From Anderson and Preston, who are unfortu- nately the only authorities we possess on the condi- tion of Masonry in England in the year 1717, we are enabled to collect the following facts :
When the Grand Lodge was re-organized in 1717, all the members of the four Lodges then in exist- ence had a right to be present at all the communi-
* " At first Fellow Crafts and Master Masons could only be made in the Grand Lodge, and it is so directed in the thirteenth of the Regulations of 1721. But in November, 1725, the Master and Wardens of a subordinate Lodge, with the assistance of a competent number of brethren, were permit- ted to confer the second and third degrees." — Anderson, second edit. p. 160. But it will be found that as soon as the Lodges were invested with this power, the Apprentices began to lose the prerogative of attending the General Assembly.
NATURE OF A GRAND LODGE. 417
cations of the Grand Lodge ; but when new Lodges were formed, this privilege was restricted to their Masters and Wardens, though it seems, that at the Grand Feast, which took the place of the Annual General Assembly, Fellow Crafts and Entered Ap- prentices were still permitted to appear and express their opinions.
The members of the four old Lodges, having first secured their inherent rights by the adoption of a resolution in the Grand Lodge that no law should ever be passed which would infringe their imme- morial privileges, thought it no longer necessary that they should attend the communications of the Grand Lodge ; and they too, like the other Lodges, trusted implicitly to their Masters and Wardens as their representatives in the Grand Lodge, so that soon after 1717, and before the year 1721, the quar- terly communications of the Grand Lodge were composed only of the Masters and Wardens of the subordinate Lodges, with the Grand Master and his officers.
But the General Assembly was still attended by the whole of the craft, whose larp;e numbers soon be- gan to prove an inconvenience ; for we are informed by Anderson that in the year 1721, the number of Lodges had so increased that the General Assembly, requiring more room, was removed from the Goose- and-Gridiron Ale-house to Stationers' Hall.*
* " Payne, Grand Master, observing the number of Lodges to increase, and that the General Assembly required more room, proposed the next Assembly and feast to be held at Stationers' Hall, Ludgate Street."— Ander son, second edit. p. 112.
18*
418 NATURE OF A GRAND LODGE.
Now, the statement of these facts enables us to reconcile two apparent contradictions in the thirty nine Regulations that were adopted in 1721.
The Twelfth Regulation says that the Grand Lodge consists of the Masters and Wardens only ; and yet the Thirty-seventh provides that at the Grand Feast the Grand Master " shall allow any Brother, Fellow Craft, or Apprentice to speak, or to make any motion for the good of /the fraternity." The apparent contradiction in these passages may be now readily explained. The Twelfth Regulation refers to the quarterly communications^ where the Masters and Wardens only were present ; the Thirty- seventh Regulation to the General Assembly, where all the craft were permitted to attend.
But this privilege of attending even the Annual Communication was soon taken from the members of the Lodges. At what precise period it is impos- sible to say, for the student of Masonic history finds himself repeatedly at fault, not only from the paucity of details and want of precision in the authorities, but frequently from the contradictory statements of the same authority. But we may gather many important suggestions from the regu- lations which were adopted at various times, while the Grand Lodge appears to have been gradually settling down into a permanent organization, and which will be found in the second and subsequent editions of the Book of Constitutions.
Thus, on the 26th of November, 1728, it was enacted that if any officer of a Lodge could not at
NATUKE OF A GRAND LODGE. 419
tend the meeting of the Grand Lodge, he might send a brother cf that Lodge, "but not a mere Entered Apprentice'."* This shows that Appren- tices, at least, were by this time disfranchised.
Again : the Thirty-ninth Regulation, adopted in 1721, had made it necessary that every amendment to or alteration of any of the Old Regulations must be submitted, at the Annual Assembly, to the perusal of even the youngest Apprentice, and be approved by a majority of all the brethren present. But on the 25th of November, 1723, it was resolved that any Grand Lodge has the power to amend or explain any of the regulations ; and accordingly the ex- planation is appended to this regulation in the second edition of the Book of Constitutions, that new regulations may be made "without the con- sent of all the brethren, at the Grand Annual Feast/'t
And finally : on the 6th of April, 1736, a Fortieth Regulation was adopted, which explicitly declared " that no brothers should be admitted into the Grand Lodge but those that are the known mem- bers thereof, viz : the four present and all former Grand Officers, the Treasurer and Secretary, the Masters and Wardens of all regular Lodges, the Masters and Wardens and nine more of the Stew- ards' Lodge, except a brother who is a petitioner or a witness in some case, or one called in by a motion."^
* Anderson, second edition, p. 159.
t Ibid, p. 176. % Ibid, p. 176.
420 NATURE OF A GRAND LODGE.
Here is an instance of that want of precision of which I have just complained. This new regu- lation may refer only to the quarterly communi- cations, although that would hardly have been necessary, as the organization of those meetings had already been provided for, or it may refer to all communications, both quarterly and annual. If the latter were the case, then it is clearly a disfranchise- ment of the Fellow Crafts and Apprentices. At all events the spirit of the regulation shows a growing tendency in the Masons of that time to restrict mem- bership in the Grand Lodge to the Grand Officers and Masters and Wardens, and to make that body strictly representative in its character.
We thus learn that Grand Lodges were at first annual assemblages, at which the Masters and Fel- lows of every Lodge were permitted to be present. They next became quarterly, as well as annual, and Apprentices, as well as Masters and Fellows, were permitted to attend. And finally, none were al- lowed to participate in the deliberations except the Masters and Wardens of the Lodges.
Let us now inquire what, after all these vicissi- tudes, has at length been settled upon, by general consent, as the organization of a Grand Lodge in the present day.
A Grand Lodge may be defined to be a congrega- tion of the representatives of the subordinate Lodges in a jurisdiction, with the Grand Master and Grand Officers at their head. It properly consists of the Grand and Deputv Grand Master, the Grand Ward-
NATURE OF A GRAND LODGE. 421
ensy the Grand Chaplain/"' Grand Treasurer and Grand Secretary, for the time being, with the Mas- ters and Wardens of the subordinate Lodges.
Every Grand Lodge is competent to make regu- lations admitting other members ; and accordingly Past Grand Officers and sometimes Past Masters are allowed to sit as members, but these possess no such inherent right, and must be indebted for the privi- lege altogether to a local regulation. f
The powers and duties of Grand Lodges will be the subject of discussion in the following chapter.
It only remains to consider the proper mode of organizing a Grand Lodge in a territory where no such body has previously existed. Perfectly to un- derstand this subject, it will be necessary to com- mence with the first development of Masonry in any country.
Let us suppose, then, that there is a territory of country within whose political bounds Freemasonry has never yet been introduced in an organized form. There may be, and indeed for the execution of the law which is about to be explained, there must be an adequate number of Master Masons, but there is no Lodge. Now, the first principle of Masonic law
* In the Thirteenth Regulation of 1721, the Grand Chaplain is not men- tioned, but at that time the office did not exist. It is clear that after the establishment of the office among the Grand Officers, he should be entitled to all the privileges belonging to the rest of his class.
f " Thus the privilege of membership in the Grand Lodge was extended by a special regulation in 1724 to Past Grand Masters, in 1725 to Past Depu- ties, and in 1727 to Past Grand Wardens." — Anderson, second edition, pp. 158-159.
422 MATURE OF A GRAND LODGE.
to which attention is to be directed, in this condi- tion of things, is, that any territory into which Masonry has not been introduced in the organized form of Lodges, is ground common to all the Ma- sonic authorities of the world ; and therefore that it is competent for any Grand Lodge to grant a warrant of constitution, and establish a Lodge in such unoccupied territory, on the petition, of course, of a requisite number of Masons. And this right of granting warrants inures to every Grand Lodge in the world, and may be exercised by^ as many as choose to do so, as long as no Grand Lodge is organized in the territory. So that there may be ten or a dozen Lodges working at the same time in the same territory, and each one of them deriving its legal existence from a different Grand Lodge.*
In such a case, neither of the Grand Lodges who have granted warrants acquires, by any such act, exclusive jurisdiction over the territory, which is still open for the admission of any other Grand Lodge, with a similar power of granting warrants. The jurisdiction exercised in this condition of Ma- sonry by the different Grand Lodges, is not over the territory, but over the Lodge or Lodges which each of them has established.
But afterwards these subordinate Lodges may desire to organize a Grand Lodge, omd they are competent to do so, under certain restrictions.
* " Thus, at the time of the organization of the Grand Lodge of California in 1850, there were five Lodges in that State working under the authority of the Grand Lodges of the District of Columbia, Connecticut, Missouri, New Jersey and I-ouisiana." — Trans. G. L. California, p. 12.
NATURE OF A GRAND LODGE. 423
Li the first place, it is essential that not less than three Lodges shall unite in forming a Grand Lodge. Dermott, without any other authority that 1 can discover than his own ipse dixit, says that not less than five Lodges must concur in the formation of a Grand Lodge * and Dr. Dalcho, who was originally an ''ancient York Mason/7 repeats the doctrine ;f but if this be the true state of the law, then the Grand Lodge of England, which was organized in 1717, with the concurrence of only four Lodges, must have been irregular.! The fact is that there is no ancient regulation on the subject ; but the necessity of three Lodges concurring is derived from the well known principle of the civil law that a college or corporate body must consist of three persons at least. § Two Lodges could not unite in a Masonic college or convention, nor form that cor- porate body known as a Grand Lodge. But not more than three are necessary, and accordingly the Grand Lodge of Texas, which was established in 1837, by three Lodges, was at once recognized as regular and legal by all the Grand Lodges of the United States and other countries.
* Ahiman Rezon, p-.xiii. third edit. f Ibid, p. 154, edit. 1822.
i The Grand Lodge of Ohio was organized in 1808 by only four Lodges, and some doubt was expressed at the time by the members of the regularity of the organization. A committee was appointed to investigate the question, of which Bro. Lewis Cass — since distinguished for his investigations in another field — was- the chairman. The committee reported the example of the Grand Lodge of England as a precedent, and the organization was consummated. It is strange that any doubt should have been entertained on the subject, as the only authority for five Lodges which at that time could have been quoted was the spurious one of Dermott.
§ Tres faciunt collegium.
424 NATURE OF A GRAND LODGE.
As soon as the new Grand Lodge is organized, it will grant warrants to the Lodges which formed it, to take effect upon their surrendering the war- rants under which they originally acted to the Grand Lodges, from which they had derived them. There is no regulation prescribing the precise time at which these warrants are to be surrendered ; but it seems reasonable to suppose that they could not surrender them before the new Grand Lodge is organized, because the surrender of a warrant is the extinction of a Lodge, and the Lodges must pre- serve their vitality to give them power to organize the new authority.
The Grand Lodge thus formed, by the union of not less than three Lodges in convention, at once assumes all the prerogatives of a Grand Lodge, and acquires exclusive Masonic jurisdiction over the territory within whose geographical limits it has been constituted. No Lodge can continue to exist, or be subsequently established in the territory, ex- cept under its authority ; and all other Grand Lodges are precluded from exercising any Masonic authority within the said territory.
These are all principles of Masonic law "which seem to be admitted by universal consent, and sanc- tioned by constant usage, in such organizations.
CHxVPTEE II. 2Ti)e ^otoers cf a ©Jranfcr jLotSQC
A Grand Lodge is the supreme Masonic authority of the jurisdiction in which it is situated, and faith- ful allegiance and implicit obedience is due to it from all the Lodges and Masons residing therein. Its functions and prerogatives are therefore of the most extensive and important nature, and should be carefully investigated by every Mason who desires to become acquainted, not only with his duties to the Order, but with his own rights and privileges in it.
The functions of a Grand Lodge are usually divided into three classes. They are —
1. Legislative;
2. Judicial;
3. Executive.
In its legislative capacity, a Grand Lodge makes the raws ; in its judicial, it explains and applies them ; and in its executive, it enforces them. Each of these functions will require a distinct section for its consideration.
426 LEGISLATIVE POWERS OF