Land Ownership
D. Richey
The U. S. Public Land Survey System and the Land
Donation Acts
State and Railroad Granted Lands
Most of the continental United States outside of the original thirteen
colonies is organized under the United States Public Land Survey (USPLS)
system. Developed to ensure proper recording and allocation of settlement
claims, the PLS system consists of township-range blocks, each six miles on
a side, each containing 36 one-square-mile sections. These blocks are identified by an alphanumeric system relating locations to the east-west baseline
(range), and north-south principal meridian (township) of a survey. Thus T3S
R2E would be the block third to the south from the baseline, and second to
the east from the principal meridian (Fig. 92a). Within each 36 one-squaremile block, one-mile sections are numbered sequentially in a regular fashion
beginning in the northeast corner and proceeding in ox-plow (“Turning like
oxen in plowing”) fashion to the southeast corner (Fig. 92b); thus sections of
the same number in different blocks occupy the same relative position. Sections are further divided into half or quarter sections, which then may be further subdivided into quarter-quarter sections. As with the larger blocks, the
locations of these divisions are identified relatively. The shaded area in Figure 92c would be referred to as the NE quarter of the SW quarter of section
31 of T3S R2E. This regular division of land creates the grid pattern seen
over most of the western United States.87
N
6 mi.
Range
E
Township
W
6
5
4
3
2
1
7
8
9
10
11
12
18
17
16
15
14
13
19
20
21
22
23
24
30
29
28
27
26
25
31
32
33
34
35
36
The Oregon Enabling Act of 1859, which conferred statehood upon Oregon, confirmed legislation creating the Territory of Oregon in deeding the
16th and 36th section of each township block to the state for the common
school fund, as well as 72 sections for a state university and 10 sections for
state buildings. To protect existing claims in these sections, the State was eligible to claim other portions of the section “ in lieu of ” these lands. Oregon
established a Board of Commissioners for the Sale and Management of
School Lands, whose primary purpose was the sale of state school lands as
quickly and expeditiously as possible.89 Despite laws promoting egalitarian
land ownership opportunity similar to the allocation caps of the previous land
sales, much land was acquired by major landholders through fraud or bribery.
The intent of the law was to auction land for a minimum of two dollars per
acre, but much of it was simply sold for the minimum price to individuals
hired by wealthy landowners to immediately resell the land to them, a technique for circumventing limits on individual ownerships.
The state legislature investigated the sale of state lands in 1872, 1878,
1889, and 1905, and despite these efforts, land sale laws were actually relaxed, allowing the sale of larger parcels at lower prices.89 The length of time
taken for the resolution of early land claims also complicated the allocation
of adjacent land claims, with the last patents not issued until 1903.89 Between
1898 and 1903, an entire third of state-granted lands were sold, and by 1910
less than a quarter of the state’s original 3.4 million acres remained, mostly
lands of lower value in eastern Oregon. This episode in state history culminated in the Land Fraud Trials of 1903 and 1905, where several public figures in Oregon, including one senator, were tried and convicted.
6 mi.
T3S
R2E
6 mi.
S
6 mi.
a. Township and range grid
b. Section grid within one township
NW1/4
Figure 92. The identification
method used in the US Public Land
Survey system. a) the location of T3S
R2E within the township grid (36
mi2), b) the location of section 31
within the section grid (1 mi2 or 640
ac), c) the NE 1/4 of the SW 1/4 of
section 31 (1/16 mi2 or 40 ac).88
NE1/4
31
NE1/4
SW1/4
SE1/4
c. Subdivisions of one section
The Territorial Organic Act passed in 1848 established a provisional
government for Oregon, made provisions for title of land to missionary outposts, and recognized prior land claims. The Act also recognized claims of
Indian title to the land, but did not provide for a system of surveying the
land. Three land donation acts were passed in 1850, 1853, and 1854 to disperse land to settlers and encourage settlement of the West. These laws extinguished Indian title, recognized the claims of settlers already residing in the
state, established provisions for the public land survey and a cutoff date for
claims to be filed, and provided for the disbursement of land to settlers arriving after the cutoff date. Adult male settlers making claims before December
1, 1851 were entitled to 320 acres (one-half section) if single, or 640 acres if
married. Subsequent claims made before December 1, 1855 were limited to
160 or 320 acres respectively. Later amendments also allowed for a payment
of $1.25 per acre in lieu of residence requirements, allowing settlers to sell
their claims. Surveying began in 1850 with the establishment of the General
Land Office and Surveyor General, and the basic framework of the survey
was completed by 1852. The intersection of the Willamette Meridian and
Baseline is at the Willamette Stone located in the hills southwest of Portland,
about 7 1/2 miles southwest of the effluence of the Willamette River into the
Columbia.30 As with the patterns of the early land claims, portions of the sur-
The railroad land grants were even larger in areal extent. Part of the
northern Pacific Railroad land grant of 1864 from Minneapolis-St. Paul to
the Pacific Ocean granted 20 alternated sections per linear mile constructed;
in Oregon this resulted in a 40-mile swath amounting to over two and onehalf million acres, approximately one third of which was conveyed into private ownership.30 In 1866 the Central Oregon Railroad land grant was secured from Congress by a company later to become the Oregon and California Railroad Company. Reorganized in 1869, the grant allowed for 20 alternately numbered sections granted for every linear mile of railroad constructed in a band 40 miles wide, expanding to a 60-mile width where the allocations could not be made in the smaller width band. As with the common
school lands, stipulations in the grant required sale only to “actual settlers,”
capped the size of parcel that could be sold and the price of sale per acre. By
1890, only 30,000 acres had been sold,30 but as timber reserves in the Great
Lakes region began to dwindle, and the price of lumber and the value of timbered land began to rise in the last decades of the century, timber interest in
the Pacific Northwest grew.89 The O & C Railroad owned some of the highest
value timberland in Oregon, and began selling larger tracts of it in 1894 in
violation of the 1869 legislation. With the Chamberlin-Harris Act passed in
1916, all but about one and one-quarter million acres returned to federal
ownership to be sold for both timber and land, with the railroads receiving
compensation for lands lost at the capped price of $2.50 an acre. In 1938, remaining O & C lands as well as some road grant lands were taken under multiple use management by the federal government, and came under the responsibility of federal land management agencies (Map 23). While the federal government was initially delinquent in payment of taxes to the counties
on these lands, the O & C lands were a source of great revenue for counties
at one time,30 and still play a significant role in the finances of some WRB
counties.
<1% 5%
2%
28%
64%
Private
28%
USFS National Forest
5%
O & C Lands BLM
2%
O & C Lands USFS
1%
State Lands
BLM
Bankhead and Jones
1%
<1%
vey initially completed were in the valleys and foothills of western Oregon,
with portions of the Coast and Cascade Ranges and southeastern state not
completed until 1910.30
County Lands
Indian Reservation
Military & COE
64%
Nat. Wildlife Refuge
Figure 93. Basinwide percentage of land area by ownership type.
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PNW Ecosystem Research Consortium
LAND USE & LAND COVER
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Map 23. 1990 Land Ownership
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Projection UTM Zone 10
Scale 1:750000
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US Forest Service
O&C Lands: USFS
O&C Lands: BLM
Bureau of Land Management
State of Oregon Lands
Military & Army Corps of Engineers
National Wildlife Refuge
Indian Reservation
Bankhead & Jones Landuse Lands
County Lands
Rail Lines
Rail Spurs
43°45’00"
43°37’30"
N
43°30’00"
S
43°22’30"
43°22’30"
123°45’00"
123°37’30"
123°30’00"
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123°07’30"
123°00’00"
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Willamette River Basin Atlas
2nd Edition
122°30’00"
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