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49th parallel north,
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49th parallel of north
latitude forms part of the
international boundary between
Canada and the
United States from
Manitoba to
British Columbia on the Canadian side and from
Minnesota to
Washington on the U.S. side. Its use as a border is a result of the
Anglo-American Convention of 1818 and the
Oregon Treaty of
1846.
History
After the United States acquired the
Louisiana Purchase in
1803, it was generally agreed that the boundary between it and British
Rupert's Land was along the
watershed between the
Missouri River and
Mississippi River basins on one side and the
Hudson Bay basin on the other. However, it is difficult to precisely determine the location of a watershed in a region of level plains, such as in central
North America. The British and American committees that met after the
War of 1812 to resolve boundary disputes recognized there would be much animosity in surveying the watershed boundary, and agreed on a simpler solution in
1818: the 49th parallel. Both sides gained and lost some territory by this convention, but the United States gained more than it lost, in particular securing title to the
Red River Basin. This convention established the boundary only between the
Lake of the Woods and the
Rocky Mountains; west of the Rockies, the convention established joint occupation of the
Oregon Country by both parties. A geographical oversight resulted in the creation of the
Northwest Angle.
Although the Convention of 1818 settled the boundary from the point of view of the non-Aboriginal powers, neither the United Kingdom nor the United States was immediately sovereign over the territories on its side of the line: effective control still rested with the local nations, mainly the
Métis,
Assiniboine,
Lakota and
Blackfoot. Their sovereignty was gradually ceded by conquest and treaty during the several decades that followed. Among these nations, the 49th parallel was nicknamed the
Medicine Line because of its seemingly magical ability to prevent U.S. soldiers from crossing it.
In the
1844 U.S. presidential election, the
Democratic Party asserted that the northern border of the
Oregon Territory should be 54°40′, later reflected in the 1846 slogan "
Fifty-Four Forty or Fight!" However, the
Oregon boundary dispute was settled diplomatically in the 1846 Oregon Treaty. This agreement divided the Oregon Country between
British North America and the United States by extending the 49th parallel boundary to the west coast, ending at the
Strait of Georgia; it then circumvents
Vancouver Island through the
Strait of Juan de Fuca. This had the side-effect of isolating
Point Roberts, Washington.
As border
thumb|200px|left|The boundary marker at the 49th parallel, dividing Surrey, British Columbia.">[Blaine, Washington and
Surrey, British Columbia.]
Although parts of Vancouver Island and much of Eastern Canada are located south of the 49th parallel, and parts of the United States (
Alaska,
Northwest Angle) are located north of it, the term
49th parallel is sometimes used as a nickname for the entire Canada-U.S. border. This can be misleading, since many of Canada's most populated regions are well south of the 49th parallel, including the two largest cities
Toronto (44° north) and
Montreal (46° north) and the capital
Ottawa (45° north) — as are the three
Maritime provinces.
Parts of the 49th parallel were originally surveyed using astronomical techniques that did not take into account slight departures of the Earth's shape from a simple
ellipsoid, and the surveys were subject to the limitations of early to mid 19th-century technology. As a result, in some places the surveyed 49th parallel is as much as several hundred feet from the actual geographical 49th parallel for the currently adopted
datum,
WGS84. The
Digital Chart of the World (DCW), which uses the Clarke 1866 ellipsoid, reports the border on average at latitude 48° 59′ 51″ north, roughly 270 m (290 yd) south of the modern 49th parallel. It ranges between 48° 59′ 25″ and 49° 0′ 10″ north, respectively 810 m (885 yd) and 590 m (645 yd) on either side of the average. In any case, the Earth's North Pole moves around slightly, notionally moving the 49th and other parallels with it - see
polar motion.
While the United States and Canada have not disputed the boundary from the original survey lines, the difference of the survey from the geographical 49th parallel was argued in front of the
Washington Supreme Court in the case of
State of Washington v. Norman, under the premise that Washington did not properly incorporate the portions of land north of the geographical 49th parallel, as laid out by detailed
GPS surveying. The court decided against the premise, ruling that the internationally surveyed boundary also served as the state boundary, regardless of its actual position.
Monuments on the border
thumb|250px|The [Peace Arch border]
*The
Peace Arch is a large monument between
Surrey,
British Columbia, and
Blaine,
Washington. It is the centerpiece of
Peace Arch Park.
*The
International Peace Garden is located at the border between
Manitoba and
North Dakota, about midway between the nearby communities of
Boissevain, Manitoba and
Dunseith, North Dakota. It has as its focal point the
Peace Towers, a pair of monuments that are 120 feet (36.6 m) tall.
*
Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park in Alberta and Montana
Other countries
On the other side of the world, the 49th parallel also passes through:
*
France*
Germany*
Czech Republic*A very small part of
Austria *
Slovakia*
Ukraine*
Russia*
Kazakhstan*
Mongolia*
ChinaSee also
*
Boundary Lake*
Canada-U.S. border*
Northwest Angle*
Point Roberts, Washington*
Oregon boundary dispute*
Pig War*
Hymns of the 49th Parallel*
Forty-Ninth Parallel (
1941 film)
External links
*
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=wa&vol=2002_sc/69417-6&invol=3 Washington v. Norman from FindLaw
Category:Lines of latitudeForty-ninth ParallelForty-ninth ParallelCategory:Boundaries of U.S. statesit:49° parallelo
