IN THE UNITED STATES. CHAPTER I. PROPERTY IN MINERALS WHERE THERE HAS BEEN NO DIVISION BETWEEN THE OWNERSHIP OF THE SURFACE AND THE MINERAL ESTATE. I. Property and Rights of the Owner of the Soil in Minerals which are in Place. II. Property in Minerals which have been severed from the Freehold. III. Property and Rights in the Minerals of Owners of the Soil who have a Limited Estate. A. Tenants for Life. B. Tenants for Years. C. Owners of Equities of Redemption. IV. Property and Rights in the Minerals where there are Joint Owners of the Soil. V. Property and Rights in Mineral Oil and Natural Gas. THE maxim of the common law is cujus est solum ejus est usque ad cœlum, and by the common law the owner of the soil has the property in the minerals lying under it, and between planes passing through the centre of the earth and the boundaries of the surface. While in place and unworked, minerals are part of the freehold, and, as such, real estate. When separated from the freehold they become personalty. Minerals in the ground are, however, capable of severance or separation in ownership from the soil, and when so severed are independently and separately inheritable and capable of conveyance. This subject of property in minerals when they are of a different estate from the soil will be discussed in the next chapter. The present chapter treats only of minerals in land in which there has been no division of the estate, whereby the title to the minerals either beneath or on the surface has become vested in some one who is not the owner of the soil. I. PROPERTY AND RIGHTS OF THE OWNER OF THE SOIL IN MINERALS WHICH ARE IN PLACE. Minerals in place, or undisturbed in the position where they have been deposited by the agencies of nature, are a part of the land and belong to the owner of the soil.1 Massachusetts. Adam v. Briggs Iron Co., 7 Cush. 361 (1851). "Prima facie the owner of freehold lands is entitled to all the minerals and strata of coal, clay, or ore, lime, marble, and the like, not as a separate estate, but as a part of the fee and inheritance, and they will pass by descent or by conveyance without special designation.” Lacustrine Fertilizer Co. v. Lake Guano and Ferti New York. lizer Co., 82, 476 (1880). The agents of the State, in digging a canal through certain land, dug up and deposited in piles. on the banks, certain marl. This was, both after and before the digging, a part of the freehold and the property of the owner in fee. (See p. 6.) Duff's Ap., 21 W. N. C. 491 (1888). The owner Pennsylvania. of a tract of land has the right to remove and convert into money for his own use the timber growing upon the surface and the minerals underlying it. Stratton v. Lyon, 53, 641 (1881). General possession Vermont. of the surface of the close in which a clay pit is situated would include the surface of the clay pit; and whoever is in possession of the surface of the soil is in law deemed to be in possession of all that lies underneath the surface. 1 The expression "in place" (in situ) has reference to the condition of the mineral deposit when it forms a part of the solid rocky crust of the earth, and occupies the position therein where it was placed ages ago by the operation of natural agencies. Thus the expression is often used of a ledge, lode, or vein, or any description of ore body; while, on the other hand, fragments which have become detached from these, and which have most commonly rolled or have been carried by other natural agencies some distance from their source, are referred to as "float." Thus the gold in a placer claim, which is usually a gravel deposit, admixed with other detrital material, in an old or present river bed, is not strictly in place, though it is true that it has been deposited in this manner by the forces of nature; namely, by the decay and erosion or washing down of the rocks containing the gold-bearing veins. The veins or lodes, however, from which these fragmental particles were derived, when found forming a part of the solid rocky mass which underlies all soil, are properly said to be in place. So also the term is properly applied to strata of coal, limestone, iron ore, etc., which belong to the owner of the soil when there has been no severance of the estates. But as is seen from the statement in the text, the owner of the soil is entitled to all valuable mineral substances which have been deposited upon his land through the agency of natural forces alone, although they may be mere float, and their original source may have been outside the limits of his property. |