Texas has a very unique legal heritage that differs in many ways from the other states in the Union. Because the first flag to fly over the area now known as Texas was the Spanish flag, many of our laws pertaining to land records were based on our Spanish legal heritage. For over three hundred years parts of Texas were under Spanish and then Mexican rule until 1836 when the Republic of Texas was formed. At that time the government chose to follow English Common Law.
Since laws pertaining to land records were already well established, the Spanish tradition continued for many years. Legal terms that historians and genealogists often find may be unusual and confusing. Such terms include empresario, league, labor (pronounced la-BOR) and varas.
An empresario was basically someone or some group that received land from the government with the commitment to bring settlers to the area. One of the first groups to settle around San Antonio was from the Canary Islands. Moses Austin and his son Stephen F. Austin are probably the best known empresarios today. The Old Three Hundred, as Austin’s colonists were called, are well documented. The last of the empresarios included the Peters Colony around Dallas and Tarrant counties and the Mercer Colony in the southern part of Hunt County.
When the Republic of Texas wanted to attract settlers, it offered land in the amounts of a league and a labor which were comparable to acres. There were three classifications depending on the date the settler arrived in Texas. The scale was also divided with more land for married settlers. When a man married, he was entitled to double the amount he first received. Additional land was given for service in the Texas Revolution.
When looking at a survey of this time period, the researcher encounters the term varas.
A vara was a length measurement equal to thirty-three inches, more or less. Through the years, surveyors have dropped the term in favor of feet and inches.
Spanish law was more respectful of women than English Common law. Under Spanish law, women were allowed to own property in their own name, something unheard in English law until well into the 19th century. As a result, Texas developed community property laws at a much earlier date than other states.
Two good references for land records can be found at the W. Walworth Harrison Public Library. E. Wade Hone wrote Land and Property Research in the United States (Salt Lake City: Ancestry Inc., 1997). It includes a section regarding the empresario system of colonization and where to locate the records. Another excellent source is Black’s Law Dictionary by Henry Campbell Black (St. Paul: West Publishing Co., 1968, fourth edition.) This is a wonderful source for interpreting legalese.