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Apex Law

A Federal mining law of the United States.

The practice of miners to follow an outcropping of a vein downward wherever it leads, even under adjacent claims, was a mining custom carried over to America from Europe and England. It was widely practiced, but undocumented, until set down as the Lode Law in Federal mining law in 1866. It was further defined and formalized in the General Mining Act of 1872.[1]

War of the Silver Kings: In 1870, Bret Maverick, defending the New Hope Mining Company’s right to mine under the Silver Lady Mine claim, read from a book on Federal mining law, “to any prospector who first locates an outcropping mineral vein, such surface indication of the ore to be known as ‘the apex of the vein,’ said owner is guaranteed the right to follow that vein downward, even when it leads under the holdings of claims located beside it.” Judge Joshua Thayer ruled in favor of the New Hope Mining Company, but his decision was overturned by a higher court at the territorial seat.[2]