Legal Description

A legal description is the written statement in a deed, patent, lease, or order that identifies the land it covers. BLM's Glossary of Surveying and Mapping Terms defines it as "a written statement recognized by law as to the definite location of a tract of land by reference to a survey, recorded map or adjoining property."

The test it must pass

BLM's Specifications for Descriptions of Land (2017) sets the standard. A description "must be susceptible to one, and only one, interpretation," and "the definition of a legally sufficient real property description is one that can be located on the ground by a land surveyor." The Specifications open with a warning: "The ambiguous descriptions of the past are the boundary disputes of the future."

The Specifications also note that the legal description contains the land description and also "defines the use, purpose, encumbrances, and timeframe" of the tract.

The three types

Descriptions fall into three general types, often combined:

1. By reference to PLSS subdivisions shown on official plats, most commonly aliquot parts and lots
2. Metes and bounds, describing land "by recital of its boundaries and/or adjoiners"
3. Lot and block, referring to subdivisions shown on a plat or map filed in a public office

Descriptions by reference to a survey

When land is granted according to an official plat, the Supreme Court held in Cragin v. Powell (1888) that "the plat itself, with all its notes, lines, descriptions, and landmarks, becomes as much a part of the grant or deed ... as if such descriptive features were written out upon the face of the deed or the grant itself."

Many nonrectangular parcels, including lode mining claims, are described by reference to their survey number. The specimen field notes in the Manual of Surveying Instructions, for example, cover the resurvey of "Mineral Surveys No. 3202, 3205, and 3206," and the accompanying plat labels them M.S. 3202, M.S. 3205, and M.S. 3206.

Clauses change what is conveyed

Clauses at the end of a description can take land out or hold rights back. In the Specifications, "except" means excluding part of the area just described, "reserving" means keeping a certain right from the area granted, and "subject to" refers to a reservation already existing. In split estates, "a provision excepting and reserving the mineral estate retains and creates title to the mineral estate in the grantor."

The federal definition

BLM's withdrawal regulations, reprinted in the Specifications, define a legal description as one "based upon either an approved and filed Federal land survey executed as a part of the United States Public Land Survey System or, where specifically authorized under Federal law, upon a protraction diagram" (43 CFR 2300.0-5(n)). Without either, it is an approved description by metes and bounds or monuments.

Why it matters in mineral title research

Mineral title turns on the words of each instrument in the chain. A patent that cites a mineral survey, a deed that excepts the minerals, and a lease described by aliquot part may each cover different ground, or different estates, in the same section.