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George Washington

Fifth, Sixth or Eighth Masonic President?

by Robert D. Haas, MPS

George Washington was not the first
President who was a Mason. He was the
fifth, or maybe the sixth; Some would
say--without foundation--the eighth
Masonic president. You may be sur-
prised to discover Brother George was
not the first President at all; he was the
fifteenth, in a sense.

What you see depends upon your point
of view, but sometimes we miss that
other point of view. Suspend your in-
credulity for a moment and consider the
following. You may get a different per-
spective on a small bit of our Nation's
history.

Our History teachers (and textbooks,
too) forgot to tell us that there were two
legal governments before the United
States of America was founded. Or if
they did tell us, they certainly made no
big deal of it.

Like the friction between mother and
daughter, the colonies became non-
cooperative and more independent in
their dealings with Mother England. Fol-
lowing the victories of the French and
Indian war, as they matured they felt
misused, scorned and abused by Great
Britain. The many real and imagined
abuses the colonies suffered caused drift
toward war.

In direct response to the Boston Tea
Party, an outraged British Parliament
imposed a series of "Repressive Acts".
These" Intolerable Acts, " as the Colo-
nies referred to them, led to the forma-
tion of the First Continental Congress
convened, in Philadelphia, in 1774. It
was to consider ways of redressing the
grievances of the colonies. Fifty-five dis-
tinguished men from all the colonies ex-
cept Georgia, were present. They
formed a loose-knit body known simply
as "The Congress." The constituents
were mostly members of the legislative
body of the Colony from which they
came. We presently call it the "First Con-
tinental Congress," but in spite of its
name, the assembly was more a conven-
tion than a congress.

Now you can't have a congress for long
until someone decides there must be a
President in charge of things, and so
there was held an election. The first
President of our country, the President of
the First Continental Congress, was a
brother Mason. He was well educated,
attending the University of Edinburgh
and graduating from William and Mary
College. Brother Randolph served in the
Virginia House of Burgesses in 1748-49
and again from 1752 to 1775.He was a
close friend of George Washington. We
don't know his mother lodge, but he was
Master of Williamsburg Lodge #6. He
was the last Provincial Grand Master of
Virginia in 1771. He visited Williams-
burg Lodge on July 5, 1774 as Provincial
Grand Master. After prolonged and
heated argument, Congress drew up a
ringing Declaration of Rights, along
with several other papers. The Declara-
tion of Rights petition, dispatched to
England by Congress, was rejected by
the Crown. Following only seven weeks
of deliberation, the First Continental
Congress disbanded, agreeing to reas-
semble as the need arose.

The drift toward war continued and in
April 1775, the famous march of the
British from Lexington to Concord
launched the War of Independence. The
month following the Concord incident
on May 10, 1775, the Second Continen-
tal Congress met with all the Colonies
represented. Randolph was replaced as
President by Henry Middleton of South
Carolina. The second President served
only five days.

John Hancock, Boston's leading mer-
chant shipper and wealthiest resident,
was a graduate of Harvard University.
He served two years and five months as
the third President of the Congress from
the spring of 1775 through 1777. During
his term, on June 7, 1776, fiery Richard
Henry Lee of Virginia, as a part of a
motion, said that "These United Colo-
nies are, and of a right, ought to be free
and independent states." After consid-
erable debate, and nearly a month later
Congress adopted the motion. Shortly
after Lee's motion a committee drafted
an appropriate statement. They gave the
job to a young lawyer from Virginia,
Thomas Jefferson. The Declaration of
Independence was formally approved by
Congress on July 4, 1776. It was a re-
nunciation of allegiance to the King and
an affirmation of the right of revolution.
The climactic achievement of Hancock's
term was the signing of the Declaration
of Independence that was a formal dec-
laration of war with Great Britain. He
contributed to the drafting and writing
of the Declaration of Independence was
minimal, but as an instrument of seces-
sion from the Empire, it required a sig-
nature. As President of the Congress, he
signed first. When asked why he wrote
his name so boldly he replied, "So that
George III may read it without putting
on his glasses.

Under Hancock's Presidency Con-
gress commissioned General Washing-
ton, entitled Bills of Credit, established a
top secret committee to secure bids and
aid from abroad and urged the colonies
to organize state governments. Although
Hancock did not initiate any of these
actions, they were taken in his name. His
Presidency marked the most active, the
most creative, span of Congressional in-
itiatives. He gave the first presidential
farewell address.

While on a business trip to Quebec,
Canada, in 1762, Hancock was made a
Master Mason in Merchants Lodge No.
277. On his return to the colonies he
affiliated with St. Andrews Lodge of Bos-
ton on October 14, 1762.

The Second Continental Congress had
no constitutional authority. Each state
in all respects, was sovereign. Each
coined its own money, raised armies and
navies, collected taxes and erected trade
barriers. Shortly before declaring inde-
pendence in 1776 the Congress ap-
pointed a committee to draft a written
constitution. The finished product was
the Articles of Confederation, adopted in
1777. The Articles made no change in
the powers of Congress and may have, to
a degree, lessened the powers of the
President. To be effective, the document
required the unanimous approval of the
Colonies. Maryland stubbornly held out
until March 1, 1781, but finally, after
ratification, "The United States in Con-
gress Assembled, " became the name of
our Country.

The Articles provided for a loose con-
federation or " firm league of friend-
ship." Each state, operating under its
own constitution, governor and legisla-
ture, provided a diversity of opinion and
each, of course, jealously guarded its au-
tonomy. Yet the similarities ofthe various
state constitutions made possible the Ar-
ticles of Confederation. There was no
provision for an executive branch but the
President still had some executive
powers.

The fourth President of the Congress
was also a Mason. After the resignation
of John Hancock, Henry Laurens be-
came President on November 1, 1777
and served until December 10, 1778.
Laurens, from Charleston, South
Carolina, was a member of Solomon's
Lodge No. 1, in Charleston and was its
treasurer in 1775. He was Grand
Steward of the Grand Lodge of South
Carolina in 1754.

Laurens was the first activist President.
He held firm opinions concerning the
need for strengthening the executive
power in the central government. He
was vain, combative and indiscreet. At
times his temper outran his prudence.
More than any other President, he was
an active participant in debate. His
tempestuous term nearly split the Con-
gress in two as he quarreled with factions
who did not agree with him. He pre-
sented a motion that failed to pass He
regarded this as a vote of no confidence
and tendered his resignation in a dra-
matic farewell address. Congress ac-
cepted his resignation and at once chose
a young Lawyer from New York, John
Jay. Laurens later traveled to Paris with
Jonn Jay and Benjamin Franklin to ne-
gotiate peace with Great Britain.

John Jay graduated from King's Col-
lege (now Columbia University) and was
a member of the Continental Congress
from 1774 to 1779. He was President in
1778 and 1779. He often asserted the
fundamental tenets of national
sovereignty; the first stirrings of the no-
tion of a strong central government. For
example, Pennsylvania refused to accept
Congress' jurisdiction over cases in Ad-
miralty. Jay asserted that "Congress is
by these United States invested with the
supreme sovereign power of war and
peace. " The major concerns of his Pres-
idency was the deterioration of the cur-
rency and inflation. Jay reminded the
"constituent" states that "the inde-
pendence of America is now fixed as fate,
and the petulant efforts of Britain to
break it down are as vain and fruitless as
the raging waves which beat against her
cliffs. " He was one of the prime builders
of the revolutionary period. Later, after
the New Constitution had been ratified

Jay became first Chief Justice of the
United States Supreme Court and joined
with Hamilton and Madison in writing
the Federalist Papers explaining the new
Constitution.

There is no documentary proof that Jay
was a Freemason, although many Ma-
sonic journals and orators have referred
to him as such. On April 21, 1779, he
wrote the following in a letter to George
Washington that has Masonic obvious
allusions: "The dissolution of Govern-
ments threw us into political chaos.
Time, Wisdom and Perseverance will re-
duce it into form and give it Strength,
Order and Harmony. In this work you
are (in the style of your profession) a
Master Builder, and may God grant that
you may long continue a Free and Ac-
cepted one. " Jay is sometimes regarded
as a "circumstantial" Mason.

After Jay's Presidency more executive
duties were assumed by new department
heads or secretaries. When the Congress
finally formed an Executive Department
six Presidents had already served and
they foreshadowed the Presidency as we
now know it. The President of the Con-
tinental Congress was elected by that
body and each one exercised limited ex-
ecutive powers under the central govern-
ment. Although there were no estab-
lished guidelines granting or withhold-
ing specific powers, the prestige of the
office allowed the President to influence
events, formulate the agenda for Con-
gress and prod it to move in certain direc-
tions. He represented Congress on for-
mal occasions and served as its
correspondent.

Thomas McKean of Delaware, the
seventh President of the Congress, may
have been a Mason, but his lodge is
unknown. A statement in the History of
Perseverance Lodge No. 21, Harrisburg
Pennsylvania, written in 1901 asserts
that McKean was a visitor to the lodge
while Governor of Pennsylvania. How-
ever the Secretary of Perseverance Lodge
in 1952 wrote that the lodge records con-
tain no information to verify the state-
ment. The biographer of the McKean
family asserts that McKean was a
Master Mason but gives no supporting
evidence.

McKean was the only continuous
member of the Continental Congress
from its inception in 1774 until peace was
signed in 1783. He served four months
as residentin 1781. An interesting side-
light concerns McKean when he was
elected to the Stamp-Act Congress in
1765. He berated the timid souls who
refused to sign the Stamp- Act, including
Timothy Ruggles, President of that
body. Because of this, a duel between the
two was arranged during a session.
Ruggles, however, left town the next
morning before daybreak.

Richard Henry Lee of Virginia, the
eleventh President of the Continental
Congress, is considered a "circumstan-
tial " Freemason by some writers . He
was referred to as a Mason, supposedly
made at Tappahanock (Hob's Hole)
Lodge, a "time immemorial" lodge,
that became extinct about 1778. No
lodge records exist verifying his mem-
bership. Lee claimed to be a member of
Hiram Lodge No. 59, Westmoreland,
Virginia, chartered in December 1799.
The Grand Lodge of Virginia also claims
him as a member.

Lee was a member of the Virginia
House of Burgesses. He opposed slavery
and proposed a tax on slaves to make the
cost of further importation prohibitive.
He was the Virginia delegate to the Con-
gress from 1774 to 1779 and was its
President in 1784 and 1785. He was a
renowned Libertarian and a zealous ad-
vocate of state's rights. He was the
author of the original resolution for inde-
pendence, as mentioned earlier. He was
the most distinguished incumbent
during his years in the Congress.

The Pennsylvania delegate to the Con-
tinental Congress from 1775 to 1787.
and its 13th President in 1786, Arthur St
Claire was one of two Presidents who
was not native born. He was born in
Thuro, Scotland, a member of the St.
Claire of Roslyn family, prominent in
Freemasonry in that country. He in-
herited a fortune from his mother and
came to America in 1757. He soon re-
signed his British commission and settled
in Pennsylvania where he became prom-
inent in all political and cultural affairs,
building a residence and erecting mills.
He participated as a Major General
under Washington in many battles of the
War for Independence. By this time, the
Congress had become a weakened
deliberating body; more a debating
society.

While Governor of the Northwest
Territory St. Claire signed a request to
the Grand Lodge of New Jersey for a
Lodge at Cincinnati, Ohio (Nova
Ceasarea Harmony Lodge No. 2). He is
recorded to have been in attendance at
many meeting of this Lodge and Ma-
sonic services were conducted at his
burial.

As the war wound down the Continen-
tal Congress, slowly dying, was reluctant
to take a step that might sign its own
death warrant. Many social, economic
political and military problems plagued
the infant country. The Congress was
ineffectual in solving or enforcing any
solutions it might suggest. Each state
jealously guarded its sovereignty and
was reluctant to relinquish power to the
Congress. The most divisive, aggravat-
ing and pressing problem was one of
tariffs and trade barriers between the
states. The Congress finally issued a call
for a convention of the thirteen states
"for the sole and express purpose of re-
vising" the Articles of Confederation.
Fifty-five delegates were appointed by
their state legislatures except for Rhode
Island who sent none. Most of them were
lawyers and old hands at constitution
making in their own states.

The Convention elected George Wash-
ington Chairman of The Convention.
His prestige served to quiet overheated
tempers, and too, most of the fiery rev-
olutionary leaders of 1776 were absent.
The time had now come for conservative
men skilled in fashioning political sys-
tems to take on the task. The Conven-
tion, however, went far beyond its as-
signment of revising the Articles of Con-
federation. In secret, it fashioned the
most startling and provocative docu-
ment the world has ever witnessed.

After 17 weeks only forty-two of the
original fifty-five members remained to
sign the new Constitution. And so the
Continental Congress, with its 14 Past
Presidents, disbanded in favor of the new
United States of America under its new
Constitution, and its first President
George Washington.

References

Richard B. Morris "Meet the Men Who Were Presidents
Before Washington"
The Smithsonian Magazine, Vol. 8,January 1978, pp.

William Denslow 10, 000 Famous Freemasons
Transactions of the Missori Lodge of Rescarch, 1958

Vol. II, pp. 173, 290; Vol. 111, pp. 69,174; Vol. IV,
pp. 10, 88.

Thomas A. Bailey The American Pageant, 2nd edition
pp.125-147
D.C. Heath and Company, 1966
