While Gammel's Laws of Texas are available on line as an authoritative compilation of all of the early legislative acts adopted under the sovereign governments of Mexico, the Republic of Texas, and the State of Texas, the index to those laws is somewhat lacking.
I have in mind compiling all of the early laws that a Texas surveyor would want to be aware of and publishing them in book form for a price that shouldn't prevent any Texas surveyor or aspiring Texas surveyor from purchasing a copy. This would include basically all acts before and after 1836 that a Texas surveyor should be aware of: land grants and roads being the focus, but including all of the other history relevant to Texas practice.
Would other Texas surveyors say there a need for this?
> Would other Texas surveyors say there a need for this?
Yes. Count me in for a copy, please.
do it
I would buy a copy as well. Decisions by Ken Gold is a great book for Texas Survey Law as well.
Kent,
I am not licensed in Texas, but I would consider that a very worthwhile endeavor. A surveyor here in Tennessee did something similar a long time ago. The book is out of print, but I was lucky enough to find a copy.
Go for it. It will be a great contribution to the profession of surveying in Texas.
Good luck!
Jimmy
I'd be interested in that, Kent.
> I'd be interested in that
I'm thinking that the easiest thing to do would be to generate an index by meaningful categories and just reprint the early laws that one would most commonly refer to. Now that a digital copy of Gammel's Laws of Texas is available on line, the index is the more necessary and useful part.
> While Gammel's Laws of Texas are available on line as an authoritative compilation of all of the early legislative acts adopted under the sovereign governments of Mexico, the Republic of Texas, and the State of Texas, the index to those laws is somewhat lacking.
>
> I have in mind compiling all of the early laws that a Texas surveyor would want to be aware of and publishing them in book form for a price that shouldn't prevent any Texas surveyor or aspiring Texas surveyor from purchasing a copy. This would include basically all acts before and after 1836 that a Texas surveyor should be aware of: land grants and roads being the focus, but including all of the other history relevant to Texas practice.
>
> Would other Texas surveyors say there a need for this?
All information is good to have. There have been many publications that have attempted to do just what you're wanting. That being said, Gammels Laws have some very obscure rules that many surveyors do not know about. The one that comes to mind, that is VERY relevant to the location of original grants, is that if a district surveyor located a grant, outside of his district, while it is not invalid, in those particular cases, the grant is not subject to the date of survey for senior rights, but date of patent.
I'm sure there are many many others that all of us don't know about also. Roads are very important, especially with regard to the titled grants (seite partidas) and how the civil law differed from common law and when to apply one versus another.
It would be interesting and I would be willing to fork over some cash for another reference book.
That would be a great resource.
I'm in.
Many past Surveying students at Tyler Junior College have collected and put together a CD of relevant court cases that is very handy.
A complete book could become required reading.
B-)
> Many past Surveying students at Tyler Junior College have collected and put together a CD of relevant court cases that is very handy.
> A complete book could become required reading.
I'm thinking as I get into compiling the index that it probably would be sufficient to give the Book and Page in Gammel's Laws of Texas where various of the early laws can be found. For example, the laws creating the counties, designating their boundaries, and modifying both are important, but it should be good enough to know where someone interested could retrieve the specific language of the statutes since they are readily available on line and there just are so many counties in Texas.
The more general laws, such as the creation and modification of the land districts and the laws specifying when a county becomes its own district, should be of such general application that they would be worth providing already copied.
There are a huge number of special laws, such as Relief Acts, that one should know generally about without needing to have the text of all of them. Book and Page ought to do fine.
Greetings?ÿ Kent.?ÿ Did this project come to fruition?
Greetings?ÿ Kent.?ÿ Did this project come to fruition?
You may have to find him on FB.?ÿ I don't believe he has posted here for several weeks at least.
Uh-oh, thank you for the heads up.
