New Jersey/New York Boundary History
Edited by Dr. James Sullivan c1927
Written by: Copyright © 1996 by Richard Frisbie
The original patent of New Jersey was bounded on the north by a line running directly from a point on the Delaware River, latitude 41 degrees 40′, to a point on the Hudson River, latitude 4I degrees, and on the east by the Hudson River. The northern line was run and marked in 1774, and the eastern line was claimed by New York as extending only to low-water mark on the adjacent waters. New Jersey claimed “full right and lawful authority to exercise jurisdiction in and over the said Hudson River and the said main sea,” including Staten Island, and, by an act of November 2, 1806, appointed Aaron Ogden, William S. Pennington, James Parker, Lewis Condict and Alexander C. McWhorter as commissioners to settle the claims. On April 3, 1806, New York appointed Ezra L’Hommedieu, Samuel Jones, Egbert Benson, Simeon Dewitt and Joseph C. Yates as commissioners to confer with the representatives of New Jersey. Their conferences were futile, however.
The controversy was not settled until 1833, in which year an agreement was made between Benjamin F. Butler, Peter A. Gay and Henry Seymour, commissioners for New York, and Theodore Freylinghausen, James Parker, and Lucius Q. C. Elmer, acting for New Jersey. The settlement was accepted in February, 1834, by the Legislatures of New York and New Jersey, and was confirmed by Congress in the following June. By the agreement the right of each State to the land under the water and to fisheries extends to the center of the channel. The State of New York was given sole jurisdiction over all the waters of the bay and river west of New York City to low-water mark on the New Jersey side, except where wharves and vessels were attached thereto. The jurisdiction was to cover the waters of Kill van Kull and of Staten Island Sound to Woodbridge Creek as for quarantine purposes.
South of this New Jersey was to have exclusive jurisdiction over the waters of the Sound and Raritan Bay westward of a line from Princes Bay Light and Manhattan Creek, subject to right of property in lands under water, of wharves, docks and vessels aground or fastened to any wharf or dock, and the right of fishing in the center of the channel. Civil process in each State could be executed upon the waters of the river and bay, except on board of vessels aground or attached to wharves in the other State, or unless the person or property be under arrest or seizure by virtue or authority of the other State. By a later survey, the point of departure of the boundary from the Delaware was set at 4I degrees 20′, instead of 41 40.
