Just out of curiosity I'm seeing how far back I can find the Acquiescence Boundary Doctrine. I found this case from 1790 which has some information about what happened. In most of the 18th Century the Reporter would only report a few lines summarizing the ruling like, "Court held the rule is X" with no facts or much other information. Some things never change, the Court says the Surveyors tried the title (presumably by putting the line in the "correct" location) when they were only supposed to locate the line:
State v. Ford, 1 N.J.L. 53 (1790):
Supreme Court of Judicature of New Jersey.
The State v. Ford and Baldwin, Surveyors
April Term, 1790.
**1 *53 1. For what causes court will quash an order of surveyors.
2. There must be notice to landlord and tenant.
3. A line of twenty-five years not to be disturbed.
4. Surveyors to go by the possession--not to alter a line on pretence of title.
Certiorari to remove the adjudication of a line fence between one Osborn and Minn, the tenant of Ogden.
The court quashed the order--
1st. Because the line was run without giving any notice to Ogden, and only four days to Minn, the tenant.
*54 2d. Because the surveyors altered a line fence acquiesced in for twenty-five years.
3d. It was proved that, as the lands became improved, a fence had always been erected according to the old line.
4th. Under pretence of settling a line fence, the surveyors have tried a title.
CITED in Miller v. Barnet, 2 South. 550.
All Citations
1 N.J.L. 53, 1791 WL 368, Coxe 53
Bold by me.
I used the West Key number system to bring up Acquiescence cases then went to the bottom of the list (hundreds of cases).
"3d. It was proved that, as the lands became improved, a fence had always been erected according to the old line."
Not so much an issue of acquiescence, as the fence perpetuated the originally marked boundary on the ground. The 25 years of "acquiescence" appears to have been taken by the court as evidence that the fence marked the original boundary.
what site did you pull it up on? Is it a paid or free one?
I got it from the Law Library's Westlaw subscription.
What I did was use Westlaw's key number search.
Topic 59-boundaries, key 48(2) what constitutes acquiescence?
Clicking on that brings up a huge list of materials which I narrowed, show me only cases and all States. It sorts them by relevance and date. Then I went to the last page and the oldest one was from 1790.
Peter Lothian - MA ME, post: 364524, member: 4512 wrote: "3d. It was proved that, as the lands became improved, a fence had always been erected according to the old line."
Not so much an issue of acquiescence, as the fence perpetuated the originally marked boundary on the ground. The 25 years of "acquiescence" appears to have been taken by the court as evidence that the fence marked the original boundary.
The old cases aren't as technical with long lists of rules with specific elements. They seem a lot more simple; you haven't complained for 25 years, get out of my courtroom. The difference between title and location is much more clear.
I have an 1803 Case (Jackson ex dem. Putnam v. Bowen, 1 Cai. R. 358 (New York-1803), 3 Johns.Cas. 596, 2 Am.Dec. 193) which involves a property that had been partitioned. The brother's Deed is 36ch.s from the south boundary to the common boundary and the sister had 100 acres per the Deed. There is an east-west road that they recognized as the boundary for decades. The brother's grandson must have measured and found out the road was only at about 29 chains because he sued the sister's grandson to recover the 7 chains of ground. As it was the sister had her 100 acres. The court found for the road based on lengthy acquiescence and testimony of various people that the brother had stated his sister owned north of the road and her house was on the north side of the road. The defendants tried to pursue the theory that 36ch.s was a mistake in the brother's deed but the court said we can't accept parol testimony to change the Deed. They ruled for the defendants on an acquiescence theory.
Peter Lothian - MA ME, post: 364524, member: 4512 wrote: Not so much an issue of acquiescence, as the fence perpetuated the originally marked boundary on the ground.
This.
Because colonial lands were surveyed prior to Mr. Jefferson's alleged improvement to the land tenure system, we generally don't have an underlying system that can be turned to when the original corners can not be located. So when we see long standing occupation in contradiction to distances reported in an old deed or map, our first thought doesn't turn to "a line being acquiesced to by the parties in place of the 'deed line' "; rather we tend to see it a evidence of the location of the original deed line as laid out at the time of the original conveyance. Nothing acquiescencey about it...just plain old following the footsteps.
James Fleming, post: 364550, member: 136 wrote: This.
Because colonial lands were surveyed prior to Mr. Jefferson's alleged improvement to the land tenure system, we generally don't have an underlying system that can be turned to when the original corners can not be located. So when we see long standing occupation in contradiction to distances reported in an old deed or map, our first thought doesn't turn to "a line being acquiesced to by the parties in place of the 'deed line' "; rather we tend to see it a evidence of the location of the original deed line as laid out at the time of the original conveyance. Nothing acquiescencey about it...just plain old following the footsteps.
I read this North Carolina case, Tucker v. Satterthwaite, 123 N.C. 511 (1898), I found because it cites Walsh v. Hill, 38 Cal. 481 (1869). They are talking about surveys and grants, etc. The case has a diagram but I can't seem to extract it. I went searching for it in Google Earth Pro and I found it! There is a Satterthwaite Road. It all looks the same in Google Earth. So I managed to get a copy of a Deed from the county, it just starts at a pipe, no mention of the original grant or survey or anything, just start at a pipe in the road, b&d to a pipe, etc. I also found a recent Survey on-line too. It's strange for a Westerner. Our descriptions tie to something, a section corner or subdivision or something. But I guess in the Eastern States, more so than out here, location really is divorced from title.
