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The Public Land Survey System (PLSS) is the surveying method developed and used in the United States to plat, or divide, real property for sale and settling. Also known as the Rectangular Survey System, it was created by the Land Ordinance of 1785 to survey land ceded to the United States by the Treaty of Paris in 1783, following the end of the ...
The townships are referenced by a numbering system that locates the township in relation to a principal meridian (north-south) and a base line (east-west). For example, Township 2 North, Range 4 East is the 4th township east of the principal meridian and the 2nd township north of the base line.
Diagram of survey township Hierarchy of systemic numbering in the PLSS. Survey townships are generally referred to by a number based on the Public Land Survey System (PLSS). A reference to the township will look something like "Township 2 North Range 3 East", or "T2N,R3E" and such a notation is used in property descriptions based on the PLSS.
The existence of section lines made property descriptions far more straightforward than the old metes and bounds system. The establishment of standard east-west and north-south lines ("township" and "range lines") meant that deeds could be written without regard to temporary terrain features such as trees, piles of rocks, fences, and the like, and be worded in the style such as "Lying and ...
The centermost land of each township corresponded to lot numbers 15, 16, 21 and 22 on the township survey, with lot number 16 dedicated specifically to public education. As the Land Ordinance of 1785 stated: "There shall be reserved the lot No. 16, of every township, for the maintenance of public schools within the said township."
Figure 1. This BLM map depicts the principal meridians and baselines used for surveying states (colored) in the PLSS.. The following are the principal and guide meridians and base lines of the United States, with the year established and a brief summary of what areas' land surveys are based on each.
The sections of each survey township are numbered according to the plan of the Land Ordinance of 1785. The Ranges are numbered starting from Ellicott's Line working westward. Townships are numbered starting from the southernmost township or partial township in each range, and numbering northward toward the Geographers line, a system called the ...
Texas, along with the original thirteen states and several others in the Southwest which were originally deeded with Spanish land grants, does not use the Public Land Survey System [1] (also known as the Section Township Range and the Jeffersonian System). Land grants from the state of Texas to railroad companies were often patented in blocks ...