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Question on Lodge Warrants (Charters)

Does your lodge Warrant (Charter) say where and when you meet ?

  • Our Warrant only has our meeting day (ie 2nd Thurs, 1st Tues ) but no mention of place

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Our Warrant only has a specific meeting place noted but not which day(s) we meet

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Our Warrant mentions the State we meet in but does record the day(s) we meet

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Total voters
    5

Bloke

Premium Member
Greetings

At lunch today, we were talking about the nature and role of Grand Lodges.

One thing Grand Lodges do is issue licenses (warrants or charters) for Lodges to meet, and we were wondering how wide spread it is for warrants to have the day your lodge meets and meeting place recorded on it. When did this start, what was the thinking around it??? We thought control and knowing where and when Lodges met..

The "traveling warrant" was something I believe the Irish invented, but putting that aside, do GLs generally record meeting place and day on the warrant they issue ?
 

Bloke

Premium Member
Our warrant were issued by UGLV and both (1952 and 2008) mention the Masonic Centre we meet at and day we meet on.
 

dfreybur

Premium Member
For all of my lodges the location and time of Stated meetings are in the bylaws. Copies of bylaws are given or offered to men when they are Raised.

This means we can change the night or location by going through the 2 month bylaw amendment process.

I've also been through name changes by the same process. I was raised in Pasadena Consolidated but after yet another couple of consolidations we trimmed it to Pasadena by the time I served int he east. I was MW for two years in Arlington Heights then we consolidated with Monitor-Lounsbury. Having been through a sequence of consolidations we changed our name to Barrington for our city in the suburbs. That's in addition to relocations. All in the bylaws with no need to change the charters.
 

Bloke

Premium Member
For all of my lodges the location and time of Stated meetings are in the bylaws. Copies of bylaws are given or offered to men when they are Raised.

This means we can change the night or location by going through the 2 month bylaw amendment process.

I've also been through name changes by the same process. I was raised in Pasadena Consolidated but after yet another couple of consolidations we trimmed it to Pasadena by the time I served int he east. I was MW for two years in Arlington Heights then we consolidated with Monitor-Lounsbury. Having been through a sequence of consolidations we changed our name to Barrington for our city in the suburbs. That's in addition to relocations. All in the bylaws with no need to change the charters.
Interesting... our GL does not give its lodges that self determination and I was unaware of it. Thanks Doug !

Sent from my SM-G920I using My Freemasonry mobile app
 

HoldenMonty

Registered User
I'm not quite sure, I haven't looked closely at our Lodge's charter, but my assumption is that it just says that we are recognized by the Grand Lodge of Pennsylvania since that is the jurisdiction my Lodge is in and when it was granted. And I'm assuming that because our charter is was granted in 1796 and I have heard that we have only been in the building we currently meet in for the last 100 years so I'm pretty sure it doesn't say the location of our meeting place.
 

Bloke

Premium Member
I'm not quite sure, I haven't looked closely at our Lodge's charter, but my assumption is that it just says that we are recognized by the Grand Lodge of Pennsylvania since that is the jurisdiction my Lodge is in and when it was granted. And I'm assuming that because our charter is was granted in 1796 and I have heard that we have only been in the building we currently meet in for the last 100 years so I'm pretty sure it doesn't say the location of our meeting place.
Could you check for me ?
 
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