Michigan Government: “All Navigable Waters are Meandered”

Michigan Assessors Manual, Volume 3, Michigan Tax Commission, published February 2018, Pages 19-20, correctly maintains the following:

“The General Land Office (G.L.O.) survey township maps continue to be the authority for determining the size, shape and even the existence of each section, Page 19. All navigable bodies of water were meandered in the public land survey system as well as many important streams and lakes not regarded to be navigable.” Page 20. (U.S. Department of the Interior. 2009. Manual of Surveying Instructions: For the Survey of the Public Lands of the United States. Bureau of Land Management. Denver, CO: Government Printing Office)

What is “meandered”? It was/is a method of surveying utilized only by the federal government for surveying the outer portion of certain bodies of water. These water bodies were not boundaries of land until the Bureau of Land Management selected them and meandered them.

Thus, navigable waters are boundary waters and they became external boundaries to the fractional lots created by grid lines. Federal surveyor-created meander lines made BOUNDARIES of bodies of water.

The acreage within the meandered water bodies was excluded from the acreage within the sections and the township totals. Ownership to the edges of the boundaries of the water bodies gave incidental or appurtenant (riparian) ownership to the center of the waters. It also signified that there was sovereign public trust easement obligations of the state over the bottomland of the meandered water bodies from the date of statehood.