The Lawrence Line was a boundary line or partition line drawn through the

Province of New Jersey The Province of New Jersey was one of the Middle Colonies of Colonial America and became the U.S. state of New Jersey in 1783. The province had originally been settled by Europeans as part of New Netherland but came under English rule after the ...

during the colonial period, dividing it into the

Province of West Jersey West Jersey and East Jersey were two distinct parts of the Province of New Jersey. The political division existed for 28 years, between 1674 and 1702. Determination of an exact location for a border between West Jersey and East Jersey was often ...

and the

Province of East Jersey The Province of East Jersey, along with the Province of West Jersey, between 1674 and 1702 in accordance with the Quintipartite Deed, were two distinct political divisions of the Province of New Jersey, which became the U.S. state of New Jersey. ...

. The line was created by surveyor John Lawrence in 1743, and sought to offer final resolution to the division between the two proprietary colonies set out on the

Quintipartite Deed The Quintipartite Deed was a legal document that split the Province of New Jersey, dividing it into the Province of West Jersey and the Province of East Jersey from 1674 until 1702. On July 1, 1676, William Penn, Gawen Lawrie (who served from ...

(1676) which divided New Jersey by a straight line from "the Northernmost Branch of said Bay or River of De la Ware which is in forty-one Degrees and forty minutes of latitude…unto the most southwardly poynt of the East syde of Little Egge Harbour." Several previous surveys, including the

Keith Line The Keith line was a line drawn through the Province of New Jersey, dividing it into the Province of West Jersey and the Province of East Jersey. The line was created by Surveyor-General George Keith in 1686, when he ran the first survey to ...

(1686), the

Coxe–Barclay Line The Coxe–Barclay Line was a boundary line or partition line drawn through the Province of New Jersey during the colonial period, dividing it into the Province of West Jersey and the Province of East Jersey. Surveyor General George Keith surv ...

(1688), the

Thornton Line The Thornton Line is a boundary line or partition line surveyed in 1696 through the Province of New Jersey during the colonial period, separating the territory into two proprietary colonies: the Province of East Jersey and the Province of West ...

(1696) were disputed and drawn too far west. Lawrence was commissioned in 1743 to resolve the long-standing disputes.Snyder, John Parr. ''The Story of New Jersey's Civil Boundaries: 1606–1968''. (Trenton, New Jersey: Bureau of Geology and Topography, 1969). Over a century later, in 1855, the

New Jersey Supreme Court The Supreme Court of New Jersey is the highest court in the U.S. state of New Jersey. In its current form, the Supreme Court of New Jersey is the final judicial authority on all cases in the state court system, including cases challenging the ...

would adopt the Lawrence Line as the final arbiter in all property settlements in ''Cornelius and Empson v. Giberson'', 25 N.J.L 1 (Sup. Ct. 1855). Today, the legacy of the Lawrence line is extant in the boundaries of several New Jersey municipalities, including Walpack Township, Sandyston Township, Stillwater Township, Hampton Township, and Green Township in Sussex County in the northwestern region of the state. In 1995, a group of surveyors attempted to plot the true coordinates of the line using

GPS The Global Positioning System (GPS), originally Navstar GPS, is a Radionavigation-satellite service, satellite-based radionavigation system owned by the United States government and operated by the United States Space Force. It is one of t ...

.Aun, Fred
"A Fine Old Line Across New Jersey"
in ''Coordinate'' (Journal of the New Jersey Society of Professional Land Surveyors) Spring 1993, Volume 15, No. 1. Retrieved 3 May 2013.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Keith Line Pre-statehood history of New Jersey History of the Thirteen Colonies Borders of New Jersey Eponymous border lines