Also known as: borders · bordering · boundary · frontier
Written by attorneys · grounded in primary & secondary sources — see below
A line or demarcation separating one territory or jurisdiction from another. The demarcation fixes the geographic limits of sovereign authority or private ownership and determines the reach of legal rules that turn on location.
Blake Butler and his predecessor mowed and maintained a strip of grass they believed lay inside their deed line. The strip actually sat across the true border on the neighbor's parcel. Because the use was open, continuous, and under a good-faith claim of right, the periods of possession tacked and satisfied the statutory period for adverse possession.
Brendan Burns owned a corner lot whose zoning classification changed when the city redrew the border between commercial and residential districts. The new line placed his parcel in a zone that barred all profitable uses. The court examined whether the border placement bore any substantial relation to public health, safety, or welfare.
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Bei Bai sued in federal court under state tort law for injuries sustained on a railroad platform. The court refused to apply a general federal common law and instead looked to the law of the state where the injury occurred, respecting the border between federal and state authority over private rights.
Brittany Bell owned Grand Central Terminal. The city imposed landmark restrictions that prevented development above the station. The restrictions operated as a border around protected structures, forcing the owner to bear preservation costs that the Court evaluated under a multi-factor takings test.
Bradley Banks purchased land just inside the newly drawn border of a residential zoning district. The ordinance prohibited industrial uses on his parcel. The Court upheld the border placement because the classification bore a rational relation to public welfare and did not arbitrarily deprive the owner of all beneficial use.
Benito Benitez lived with his grandchildren in a single-family home. A city ordinance defined family to exclude that arrangement and treated the household as violating the zoning border. The Court struck down the ordinance as an arbitrary intrusion on protected liberty interests in family living arrangements.
A good-faith belief that land lies on the claimant's side of the border permits tacking of successive periods of possession. The continuity requirement can still be satisfied even when seasonal use matches the nature of the property.
A zoning border may be invalid when it lacks a substantial relation to public health, safety, or welfare and arbitrarily deprives the owner of beneficial use of the land. Courts examine whether the classification as applied to the specific parcel is reasonable.
Federal courts must apply state substantive law to private rights rather than a general federal common law. The border between federal and state domains therefore determines the governing rule of decision.
…Pet. 492, 525. Compare Jackson v. Chew , 12 Wheat. 153, 162, 168; Livingston v. Moore , 7 Pet. 469, 542. [^maj-3]: Pepper, The Border Land of Federal and State Decisions (1889) 57; Gray, The Nature and Sources of Law (1909 ed.) §§ 533-34; Trickett, Non-Federal Law Administered in Federal Courts (1906) 40 Am. L. Rev. 819,…