Land Ordinance of 1785 - Seven Ranges - mineral rights
The Land Ordinance of 1785, under which the Seven Ranges in Ohio were surveyed, reserved for the federal government a fractional share of certain mineral rights:
"There shall be reserved the lot No. 16, of every township, for the maintenance of public schools, within the said township; also the one-third part of all gold, silver, lead and copper mines, to be sold, or otherwise disposed of as Congress shall hereafter direct."
Does this part of the law apply today in any way? That is, if a current landowner within the original Seven Ranges discovered copper and began to mine it today, would a third of that income go directly to the federal government?
- Doug
I dunno Doug...it sure "sounds like it" though.
I've never done any work in that area, but it is something that one might want to look into. A LOT of things changed by the time they got out to my neck of the woods (mid-1800s).
Loyal
I don't know about the area in Ohio and the question, but I do know that the Master Title Plats of BLM do show the areas that oil and gas and minerals have been reserved to the Feds.
These areas are leased by BLM and the lease money goes to the Feds.
I think that the Acts of March 26, 1804 and March 1807 made any previous grants for lead and salt reservations null and void, and future mineral reservations were not provided for until the Acts of March, 1847.
Apparently no gold, silver, or copper was discovered and reserved in the Old Seven Ranges, or any of the other areas surveyed under the Ordinance of 1785, prior to the change in policy.
Thanks CZ. I found a copy of the Act of March 26, 1804.
It's not clear to me that this Act was intended to apply to land already sold under the Act of 1785, so I'm wondering if the mineral reservations were unaffected for land already sold. The new Act certainly doesn't require the same reservations for any of the new territories to be sold; perhaps the lack of metals in the Seven Ranges made that clause seem irrelevant.
- Doug
I was not referring to the verbiage of the acts themselves but to the interpretation of the Acts as described by the US Supreme Court in Volume 15 of the Court's Reports:
The only mineral reservations I am aware of anywhere in Ohio were salt reservations, a mineral most valuable on the early frontier. Once the general availability of salt was ensured, the US Congress, by the Act of December 28th, 1824, authorized the State of Ohio to dispose of those reservations and apply the proceeds to school,and literary purposes.
Thanks. It's going to take me a while to digest all of this.
- Doug
