How the Masons Got In City Hall

by Ward Schaefer

When Mayor Harvey Johnson Jr. mentioned in passing at a Sept. 15 City Council meeting that the city shares City Hall with a local Masonic lodge, it was the first many had heard of the longtime Jackson urban legend. This legend, however, happens to be true, and nothing like a Dan Brown novel.

Councilman Jeff Weill, who says he had heard about the relationship "peripherally," unwittingly resurrected the story when he asked Johnson about the city's need for 24-hour security at City Hall.

"We've got a 24-hour armed guard even on weekends," Weill told the Jackson Free Press. "There's no reason we need a person like that, when most other public buildings in Jackson just have an alarm system."

Johnson explained to Weill that the city had to pay for around-the-clock security to accommodate the Masons. Weill, always vigilant about fat in the city budget, considers the roughly $50,000 that the city pays for City Hall security excessive.

"I can't imagine the Masons would throw up their hands and cry outrage if we didn't have an armed security guard in City Hall on the Fourth of July," Weill said.

Still, Weill was intrigued by the relationship and sent requests for information to the Masons and the mayor's office.

"I've heard that somewhere deep in City Hall is a Masonic lodge-looking thing," Weill said. "When (former Mayor) Frank (Melton) was alive, he told me he was going to give me a tour of City Hall to show me that room. We never got around to doing that."

Weill's peripheral knowledge of the Masons' claim to City Hall is typical of city leaders. Former Councilman and Jackson State University professor Leslie McLemore said that he knew of little more than the presence of a Masonic meeting room in City Hall.

"I just know we have the arrangement," McLemore said. "I was sort of surprised to learn about it when I joined the City Council."

Former Mayor Kane Ditto also confessed to knowing little about the agreement, other than its existence. "I know during my term in office it was discussed several times, but I don't know that I've actually seen documentation," Ditto said.

City spokesman Chris Mims confirmed that the city does have an agreement with the Masons allowing the organization use of a third-floor meeting room in perpetuity, but he could not retrieve any formal documentation of the relationship.

The Masons' claim to City Hall dates back to the building's construction, which began in 1846, Mims said. In that year, the mayor and aldermen of the city of Jackson, which was still in its infancy, began to discuss consolidating government functions into a single building. An act passed by the state Legislature nearly a decade earlier had already granted the Jackson Masonic organizations the right to build a lodge on the same site, however.

Read the rest of the story at jacksonfreepress.com.