CHAPTER 1 LAND DESCRIPTIONS AND THE PUBLIC LAND SURVEY SYSTEM

• Jurisdiction: United States

Nuts & Bolts of Mineral Title Examination
(Apr 2015)
CHAPTER 1
LAND DESCRIPTIONS AND THE PUBLIC LAND SURVEY SYSTEM
Nicholas T. Haderlie
Attorney
Crowley Fleck PLLP
Sheridan, Wyoming

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NICHOLAS T. HADERLIE is an associate with the law firm Crowley Fleck PLLP in Sheridan, Wyoming. His practice focuses on energy, environment, and natural resources law throughout the Rocky Mountain region. Mr. Haderlie represents industry clients in a variety of oil and gas related transactional and civil litigation matters, including preparation of title opinions, right-of-way acquisition, and the purchase and sale of oil and gas interests. He received his M.A. in Environment and Natural Resources with honor from the Haub School of Environment and Natural Resources, and a J.D. with honor from the University of Wyoming College of Law. Mr. Haderlie is licensed to practice law in Colorado, Montana, North Dakota, Utah, and Wyoming. He is currently serving as the 4th Judicial District Commissioner of the Wyoming State Bar (2014-2017), and Chair of the Energy and Natural Resources Section of the Wyoming State Bar (2014-2015). Mr. Haderlie has published in the Wyoming Law Review and the AAPL's Landman Magazine, and regularly presents on oil and gas related topics to the Wyoming Association of Professional Landmen and the University of Wyoming Professional Landman Program.

Land Descriptions and the Public Land Survey System: A Practical Overview for the Mineral Title Examiner

I. Introduction

Understanding legal land descriptions is a fundamental part of mineral title examination. The two predominant methods for describing land in the western United States are by reference to rectangular governmental surveys, and by metes and bounds. Rectangular survey descriptions refer directly to a governmental survey map that has been drawn to scale, and which outlines divisions of land according to a predetermined system. Metes and bounds descriptions consist of a written narrative defining "the territorial limits of real property as measured by distances and angles from designated landmarks and in relation to adjoining property."¹

This paper provides a brief history and overview of land descriptions and the Public Land Survey System in the western United States, followed by a practical discussion of problems that arise for title examiners with respect to land descriptions. The background section first summarizes the creation of the governmental survey system followed by an overview of its working parts. The background section goes on to discuss other methods of describing land, including subdivision platting and metes and bounds surveys. A synopsis of the importance of determining the size of a particular tract of land to determine oil and gas cost and revenue sharing proportions concludes the background section.

Next the discussion section describes common issues title examiners encounter when faced with incorrect, vague, or ambiguous land descriptions, including problems arising from subdivision platting, problems encountered with metes and bounds surveys, and issues presented by quasi-metes and bounds descriptions. The discussion concludes with a summary of issues surrounding governmental resurveys and the priority of surveys on patented lands.

II. Background

A. The Birth of the Public Land Survey System (PLSS)

If land ownership is to be divided, discretely identifiable boundaries of land parcels must be defined. While defining the size and shape of a boundary is easy (e.g., a 10-acre square), locating a parcel requires reference to a particular position on the surface of the earth. In theory the location of a parcel of land could be defined purely by reference to latitude and longitude coordinates, but such definitions are impractical due to the technical difficulty of precisely identifying lines of longitude.² As a result, practically all legal land descriptions relate in some

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way to a definite physical starting point located on the ground called a monument.³

Although "free surveys" beginning from any point once existed in the United States, virtually all surveys today depend directly or indirectly on established monuments.⁴ New parcels are described either in direct relation to a fixed monument, or indirectly by reference to an existing surveyed boundary that had been previously defined in relation to a fixed monument. Monuments are therefore the backbone of modern land location systems.⁵ Geographic features like rocks, trees, and rivers were often used as monuments in the early days of land location. But rocks erode, trees die, and rivers meander. Natural monuments are also vulnerable to intentional movement or destruction--rocks are ploughed, trees are felled, and rivers are dammed. Even man-made surveying stakes are susceptible to obliteration. Luckily, lost or moved monuments can be replaced or relocated so long as numerous monuments have been related to one another with reliable measurements.⁶ A lost monument can be reset according to its previously known distance and direction from other monuments.

Various systems were used in colonial America for locating land in relation to monuments, but no uniform system took hold until demanded by a budding nation's need for revenue on the heels of the Revolutionary War.⁷ Deeply in debt to France and with no authority to levy taxes, the Continental Congress looked to selling the one significant asset in its possession: the vast public domain lands of the Northwest Territory.⁸ A uniform system to identify, divide, and catalog the lands therefore became necessary in order to dispose of the property and generate revenue. This dilemma gave rise to the Land Ordinance of 1785, which adopted a rectangular survey system developed by a committee chaired by Thomas Jefferson, who was a proficient surveyor.⁹

Although the system has been refined, its basic tenets remain intact and most land added to the United States since passage of the ordinance has been surveyed under the system, which has become known as the Public Land Survey System or PLSS.¹⁰ The survey of the Northwest Territory started on the banks of the Ohio River and moved west as the United States expanded over time, particularly after the major acquisitions of the Louisiana Purchase from France in 1803, and the Mexican Cession under the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848.¹¹

B. Overview of the Public Land Survey System (PLSS)

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As discussed above, the PLSS is the method of dividing and describing land that has become the cornerstone of public land disposition in the United States. With few exceptions, the PLSS forms the basis of virtually all legal land descriptions employed in the southern and western United States,¹² and is therefore of critical importance to the mineral title examiner. The PLSS consists of a network of Principal Meridians and Base Lines that superimpose a grid system over the geography of the United States as shown in Appendix A.¹³ The Principal Meridians and Base Lines refer directly to lines of latitude and longitude chosen largely on the basis of natural or political boundaries, which have been memorialized by fixed monuments.

Principal Meridian lines run north-south, and Base Lines run east-west (Figure 1). From these two controlling survey lines, additional lines running parallel to the Base Line approximately every six miles above and below the Base Line divide the land into numbered Townships. For example, the second Township line south of the Base Line is called "Township 2 South." Similarly, lines running parallel to the Principal Meridian divide the land into numbered Ranges approximately every six miles. The third Range west of the Principal Meridian is called "Range 3 West." While the term "Township" refers to the lines parallel to the Base Line, the term is also used to generally refer to the six-mile by six-mile parcel of land that is outlined by the intersection of each of the Township and Range lines. To continue the example, the Township that is two miles south of the Base Line and three miles west of the Principal Meridian is identified as "Township 2 South, Range 3 West," commonly abbreviated as T2S/R3W.

Each six-mile by six-mile Township is further divided into 36 one-mile square Sections containing approximately 640 acres each. Sections are numbered 1 through 36 beginning in the northeast comer of each Township. Section numbering runs from east to west beginning with Section 1, then loops back the opposite way beginning in the next row, alternating back and forth with each successive row until finally ending with Section 36 in the southeast corner (Figure 2). The numbering pattern of Sections is known as boustrophedonic, a Greek word meaning "turning like oxen in plowing."¹⁴

Official governmental surveys within the PLSS typically only describe the one-mile square Section. However, Sections may be further divided on the basis of halves and quarters, reducing the parcels to sizes more common in day-to-day property transactions. As noted above, a Section contains approximately 640 acres, a half Section therefore has 320 acres, a quarter Section has 160 acres, a half-quarter Section has 80 acres, and a quarter-quarter Section equals 40 acres (Figure 3). Each such fraction of land in the system is called an aliquot part.

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Figure 1. The Township and Range lines that run parallel to the Base Line and Principal Meridian respectively form a grid system of Townships, which are further divided into a smaller grid system of Sections. Sections are then divided into halves, quarters, half-quarters, quarter-quarters, etc.¹⁵

Figure 2. Each Township is subdivided into 36 Sections numbered in a pattern in which each row is numbered in opposite directions, beginning with Section 1 in the northeast corner and ending with Section 36 in the southeast corner. ¹⁶

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Figure 3. Each Section may be subdivided into hierarchical

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