Show THE DUCHESNE UINTAH BOUNDARY LINE Is not decided to suit chas demoisy of vernal the eminent jurist AP makes the assertion that the county line Is still unsettled vernal utah jan 24 1916 to the hon board of county commissioners uintah county utah gentlemen in the matter of the letter of the state engineer dated january 17 1916 purporting to establish the boundary line between duchesne and uintah counties which has been referred to me for an opinion as to its effect I 1 have the honor to advise you as follows the only provision for the location on and establishment ment of a disputed or uncertain county boundary is found in section compiled laws of utah 1907 and reads as follows whenever any dispute or uncertainty shall arise as to any county boundary the s same ame may ie determined by the county surveyors of the counties interested and in case they fail to agree agre or otherwise fail to establish the boundary the board of county commissioners of either or both po e counties unties interested shall engage ahe services of the state engi veer who with the aforesaid county surveyors or either of them if but one appears for that purpose all having received due and proper notice shall proceed forthwith to permanently determine uch such boundary line by ivak waking hg the necessary surveys and er ec suitable monuments ahn ts t to 0 designate said boundaries aich shall ba deemed permanent until superseded by legislative enactment nothing in this section shall be construed to give the surveyors or state engineer mentioned herein any fu further authority than to erect suitable monuments to designate said boundaries aa as they are now established bylaw by law in his lette the state engineer says the territorial act of reb feb 18 1880 1990 creating uintah county and defining its boundary lines defined the west logun boundary dary line as being the meridian to the point where it intersected green river at the time of statehood and aind by the provisions of section 1 article 11 construction of utah the sev eral cral counties of the territory were adopted and recognized as legal subdivisions of the state the meridian therefore became the legal boundary line between betge en wasatch Wa atch and uintah counties and when duchesne county was created it became the legal boundary line between that county and uintah county and he might have added that at a there has been no lawful enactment or proceeding since the creation of duchesne county affecting the boundary line the meridian is now the legal boundary line between the two counties he further says it Is not the meridian that the state engineer is required to establish ta but the boundary line between wasatch now duchesne V county and uintah counties as intended by the territorial legislature in 1880 and approved by the state constitution it is my belief that this line was intended as a line 2 and 30 of longitude west of the uintah special meridian and which at that time was believed to be the meridian this assertion is chimerical for a belief must c be based upon fact and there Is ig no fact to support such a belief the state engineer has no law ful authority acting alone to K establish a disputed county p boundary when the county sur J of the two counties in crested er ested as in the present case fail to establish the boundary the board of county commissioners of either or both coun counties interested shall engage the services of the state engineer who ahoi with the aforesaid county sur or either of them if but one appears for that purpose shall proceed etc when the state engineer acts in a county boundary dispute he be must act with one or both of the county surveyors he has no authority to act alone the statute provides not only who shall act but also the manner in which the boundary shall be determined the state engineer with one or both of the county surveyors shall proceed forthwith to permanently determine mine such boundary line by making the necessary surveys an and d erecting suitable ae monuments to designate such boundaries etc the state engineers engineer Engine erl has knowin knowingly ily ignored the pro visions of them the statute as to the manner of determining and marking the boundary for he exi excuses I auses himself from so doing on the ground that mr harmston acting for the commissioners of I 1 wasatch county in january 1908 1909 calculated the location of the boundary line and that its location on the ground is known the state legislature mu must t have forseen that some of the officers mentioned in said see sec would assume powers outside of beyond their duties as survivors vors for it provided nothing in this section shall b bs construed to give the surveyors or state engineer mentioned herein any further authority than to erect suitable monuments to designate said boundaries as they are now established by law yet in the face of this express prohibition the state engineer has assumed the powers of a jury as to the facts and the functions of a court as to the law aw and has considered matters other than the lawful boundary which he recognizes and concedes as established by law and andi argues from a wholly imaginary theory that neither the territorial legislature that established the boundary line nor thel the constitutional convention that approved and adopted the bound ary line so established nor the thel state legislature that enacted a statute in conformity therewith meant that the meridian should be th the e boundary between the two counties buti but that each of said legislative bodies meant that the boundary should be a line so many minutes and seconds west from another line not mentioned by them or either of them the action of the state engineer has not settled this question of the location of the disputed boundary line his purported decision does not determine anything I 1 in the matter at law it is a nullity he has not followed the statute that confers upon him the only power he has to act at all he has in fact dig disobeyed the provisions of the statute while admitting that the lawful awful boundary line is clearly defined and described he has located the boundary at another place he has assumed authority that is expressly denied him by statute in my opinion the question off of the location of the boundary line between uintah and duchesne counties is still unsettled and is exactly in the same condition as it was in the spring of 1913 when your county surveyor called the matter to your attention 1 very respectfully charles charlca demoisy county attorney |