Rensselaer Republican, Volume 17, Number 16, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 December 1884 — Correction Lines. [ARTICLE]

Correction Lines.

Tlie law establishing our system of Government surveys, while it requires that the north and south lines shall be true meridians, also requires that the townships shall each bo six miles square. To fulfill both of these conditions is physically impossible, for the figure of the earth causes the meridians to converge toward the pole, thus making the north line of each township shorter than its south line, an inequality becoming more and more marked the higher the latitude of the surveys. Provision is therefore made for correcting the errors thus caused, by fixing what are called correction lines, which are parallels boundiug a line of townships on the north when lying north of the principal base, or on the south when lying south of the principal base, from which the surveys as they are continued are laid out anew, the range lines again starting at correct distances from the principal meridian. These correction lines are placed at difterent intervals in different States, sometimes being repeated at every fifteen townships, sometimes at every tenth, or other distances. Each range of townships must be made as much over six miles in width on each base and correction line as it will fall short of the same width where it oloses on to the next correction lino nortn, and wherever the exterior line of the townships shall exceed or shall not extend six miles, the excess or deficiency must be added to or be deducted from the western or northwestern sections or half-sections in such township, according as the error may be in running the lines from east to west or from north to south. In order to throw the excess or deficiencies on the north and on the west sides of the township it is necessary to survey the section lines from south to north on a true meridian, leaving the results in the north line of the township to be governed by the convexity of the earth and the converging of the meridian.— lnter Ocean.