Historical Inquiry into the Origins of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite

by James Foulhouze

Edited by Jonathan K. Poll

Foreword by Michael R. Poll

This book is James Foulhouze’s account of the events during the turbulent times in Louisiana Masonry of the 1840’s and 50’s and gives us his views on the nature and history of the AASR. Included also is valuable information on the activities of the Supreme Council of Louisiana and additional insight into the “Scottish Rite War” between the Supreme Council of Louisiana and the Supreme Council, Southern Jurisdiction, USA of the mid 1800’s. The slugfest between James Foulhouze and Albert Pike is classic. These two well accomplished lawyers were skilled at debate and legal tactics. Understanding the position of Foulhouze, from his own words, is essential to our understanding the “why” of his actions. The foreword looks at the equally fascinating and mostly unknown period following the Civil War and with Foulhouze’s departure from Masonry. James Foulhouze’s 1859 “Historical Inquiry” is a vitally important work for any student of the Scottish Rite.

Previous Cornerstone editions of this book have been available as a photographic reproduction of James Foulhouze’s original work. At the time this was the most efficient method of reprinting this historically significant piece of Masonic history without it becoming cost prohibitive. However, as technology has advanced and become more accessible, we are pleased to offer this plain text edition in both paperback and hardback formats. This was achieved using a combined method of optical character recognition technology and careful manual review of the text to ensure faithfulness to the original manuscript. Through this process improvements were made to some of the original formatting bringing it to a more modern standard. In addition, typos and minor errors in the original text were corrected in this new edition. We hope you enjoy this newly reconstructed text, as Cornerstone Publishers continues its mission to bring more historical Masonic works to a new generation of readers.