Many learned minds with a better understanding of the law or land surveying, or both, have expressed the idea that the land surveyor is both judge and jury when it comes to rendering a well-reasoned opinion on the location of property boundaries.

One of the most famous and oft-quoted, and a man who was arguably one of the greatest legal minds of his era, was Justice Thomas M. Cooley. Twice he spoke to the Michigan Association of Surveyors and Engineers in the late 1800’s, resulting in two versions of a paper entitled “The Judicial Functions of Surveyors.” The latter version of that paper published in “The Michigan Engineer” in 1883, is the version most widely quoted.[i]