Articles Posted in Recent Cases

On April 24, the Supreme Court issued an opinion in two consolidated appeals, Boren Descendants v. Fasken Oil and Ranch, Ltd., and Mabee Ranch Royalty Partnership LP v. Fasken Oil and Ranch, Ltd. I wrote about the Eastland Court of Appeals, decision in these cases in December 2024. The issue is construction of a 1933 deed of 60,000 acres in which the grantor reserved “an undivided one-fourth (1/4th) of the usual one eighth (1/8th) royalty.” Fasken owns the reserved royalty and the Boren and Mabee descendants on the fee mineral interest. Relying on the Supreme Court’s guidance on how to construe such deeds in Van Dyke v. Navigator Group, the Eastland Court held that the deed reserved a “floating” 1/4th of the royalty.

The more interesting part of the case is the applicability of the presumed grant doctrine, also addressed in Van Dyke. The appeal of the Fasken cases was a permissive interlocutory appeal; the Eastland Court refused to consider the the Boren and Mabee parties’ contention that the presumed grant doctrine applied, concluding that it was not one of the issues referred by the trial court for the interlocutory appeal.

The Supreme Court has elected to return the case to the Eastland Court for further proceedings. First, it told the Eastland Court that it should consider the Supreme Court’s more recent opinion in Clifton v. Johnson, which addressed a another fraction-of-royalty issue. Second, it said the Eastland Court should have considered the Boren and Mabee parties’ claim that the presumed grant doctrine applied.

On March 3, 2026, the Texas Supreme Court issued its opinion in Fasken v. Puig, No. 24-1033. It reversed the courts below and held that the words “free of all costs” in a reservation of a non-participating royalty interest did not include post-production costs. The reservation, in a 1960 deed covering lands in Webb County, reads:

There is SAVED, EXCEPTED AND RESERVED, in favor of the undersigned, B. A. Puig, Jr., out of the above described property, an undivided one-sixteenth (1/16) of all the oil, gas and other minerals, except coal, in, to and under or that may be produced from the above described acreage, to be paid or delivered to Grantor, B. A. Puig, Jr., as his own property free of cost forever. Said interest hereby reserved is Non-Participating Royalty . . . .

In Chesapeake v. Hyder,  483 S.W.3d 870 (2016), the Texas Supreme Court ruled on a similar issue. The Hyders’ lease contained an unusual provision granting them an overriding royalty on production from horizontal wells the surface location of which was on the Hyders’ land but whose lateral produced from adjacent land. The reservation of overriding royalty provided that they would receive “a perpetual, cost-free (except only its portion of production taxes) overriding royalty of five percent (5%) of gross production” from such wells. Chief Justice Hecht, joined by four other justices, held that the overriding royalty must be paid free of post-production costs. Justice Hecht said that “We disagree with the Hyders that ‘cost-free’ … cannot refer to production costs. … But Chesapeake must show that while the general term ‘cost-free’ does not distinguish between production and post-production costs and thus literally refers to all costs, it nevertheless cannot refer to post-production costs.”  Four justices dissented; they concluded that, because the overriding royalty was based on “gross production,” it was valued at the well, and so the Court’s prior decision in Heritage v. NationsBank meant that, not withstanding the cost-free language, post-production costs can be deducted.

On December 2, 2025, the Texas Supreme Court issued its opinion in Clifton v. Johnson, No. 23-067. This is the first Supreme Court case on fixed vs. floating since its decision Van Dyke v. The Navigator Group, 668 S.W.3d 363 (Tex. 2023), its effort to clarify how double-fraction conveyances and reservations should be construed.

The reservation construed in Van Dyke was a mineral reservation:

It is understood and agreed that one-half of one-eighth of all minerals and mineral rights in said land are reserved in grantors … and are not conveyed herein.

The Corpus Christi Court of Appeals, in Devon Energy Production Co. v. Robert Leon Oliver, No. 13-25-00131-CV, has reversed a $9 million judgment against Devon in a suit for failure to pay royalties in accordance with Oliver’s leases. The court followed the reasoning of the Texas Supreme Court’s opinions in Heritage Resources v. NationsBank, 989 S.W.2d 118 (Tex. 1996), holding that Oliver’s lease provision prohibiting post-production-cost deductions from Oliver’s royalty was “surplusage,” and that Oliver’s royalty should be based on the “market value at the well.”

Oliver’s leases were on a printed form with an addendum that provided the addendum’s provisions would prevail over any conflicting language in the leases. The royalty clause in the lease form provided that the royalty on oil would be

1/5th of all oil produced and saved by lessee from said  land, or from time to time, at the option of lessee, to pay lessor the average posted market price of such 1/5th part of such oil at the wells as of the day it is run to the pipeline or storage tanks, lessor’s interest, in either case, to bear 1/5th of the cost of treating oil to render it marketable pipeline oil. …

After the Texas Supreme Court issued its opinion in Van Dyke v. The Navigator Group, 668 S.W.3d 363 (Tex. 2023), setting out presumptions to apply when construing royalty conveyances and reservations that contain so-called double fractions, it considered Thompson’s petition for review of the San Antonio Court of Appeals’ opinion in Hoffman v. Thomson, 630 S.W.3d 427 (Tex.App.–San Antonio 2021) construing another royalty fraction deed. The Supreme Court remanded the case back to the San Antonio court, instructing it to reconsider its decision in light of the Supreme Court’s opinion in Van Dyke. Thomson v. Hoffman, 674 S.W.3d 927 (Tex. 2023). The San Antonio Court has now issued its second opinion, reaffirming the conclusion it reached in its first opinion. 2026 WL 758737, March 18, 2026.

The deed being construed in Hoffman v. Thomson contains the following relevant language:

[T]here is hereby expressly reserved … an undivided three thirty-second’s (3/32’s) interest (same being three-fourths (3/4’s) of the usual one-eighth (1/8th) royalty) in and to all of the oil, gas and other minerals ….

Today the Supreme court accepted the petition for review in Boerschig v. Rio Grande Electric Cooperative, No. 24-0213, a case in which the trial court granted an easement by estoppel based on a jury verdict.

In 2002 Boerschig purchased the 6,397-acre U-Bar Ranch. At the time there was a 1.6 mile distribution line with wooden poles carrying four wires, constructed in 1947. Boerschig was unable to locate any recorded easement for the line.

In 2012 RGEC bulldozed the 1947 line and began construction of a new line with more, larger poles carrying seven wires, for a new compressor station to be operated by Lone Star NGL Pipeline. Boerschig objected to the line, and litigation followed. After a jury trial, the jury found that RGEC failed to obtain a prescriptive easement, but that it did acquire an easement by estoppel, and that the new line constructed by RGEC was within the scope of that easement. The trial court rendered judgment on the verdict and awarded RGEC its legal fees.

Today the Texas Supreme Court denied PPC’s petition for review in  PPC Energy v. Basic Energy Services, No. 25-0061. I wrote about the opinion of the El Paso Court of Appeals, which reversed and remanded a trial court judgment of $13 million against Basic after jury trial . Basic operates disposal wells, and the jury found that its wells had damaged PPC Energy’s producing wells. The El Paso court held that the trial court had erroneously failed to submit a requested jury charge on the prudent operator standard and remanded for retrial.

Today the Texas Supreme Court agreed to decide another dispute over whether a conveyance is of a fixed or floating royalty. No. 23-0671, Clifton v. Johnson. The El Paso Court of Appeals held that the instrument in question conveyed a floating royalty – a fraction of the royalty. 2023 WL 444316. The Petitioners argue, among other things, that the Van Dyke presumption (Van Dyke v. Navigator Group, 668 S.W.3d 353 (Tex 2023)) should not apply to conveyances and reservations of royalty interests. The deed in Clifton refers to the interest being conveyed as “1/128 (1/16 of the usual 1/8 royalty).” The Supreme Court said in Van Dyke:

When courts confront a double fraction involving 1/8 in an instrument, the logic of our analysis in Hysaw [v. Dawkins, 483 S.W.3d 1 (Tex. 2016)] requires that we begin with a presumption that the mere use of such a double fraction was purposeful and that 1/8 reflects the entire mineral estate, not just 1/8 of it.  … Our analysis in Hysaw thus warrants the use of a rebuttable presumption that the term 1/8 in a double fraction in mineral instruments of this era refers to the entire mineral estate. Because there is “little explanation” for using a double fraction for any other purpose, this presumption reflects historical usage and common sense.

Note that the devise construed as a floating royalty in Hysaw v. Dawkins was a devise of a royalty interest, not a mineral interest.

ExxonMobil Pipeline owned a 1944 pipeline easement crossing a 126.7-acre tract. Its predecessor Humble Pipeline constructed an 11-mile pipeline crossing the tract. In 2000 ExxonMobil sold the pipeline to Salter Creek Resources. The assignment provided that “This Agreement may not be assigned, in whole or in part, without the prior written consent of the other Party hereto, and any such assignment that is made without such consent shall be void and of no force and effect.”  Salter Creek assigned the easement to Coffeyville Resources, which assigned it to Rose Rock, which assigned it to SemGreen–all without obtaining ExxonMobil’s consent.

In 2017, the owner of the 126-acre tract discovered crude seeping into a stream and complained to the Railroad Commission, which determined that the leak occurred when ExxonMobil was the owner and ordered it to clean up the spill. ExxonMobil sued Coffeyville, Salter Creek, Rose Rock and SemGreen alleging they had responsibility under the assumption of liability provisions of the original assignment.

In Coffeyville Resources v. ExxonMobil Pipeline Company, the Tyler Court of Appeals held that, because no consents to assignment were obtained, the assignments were void, so the defendants had no liability for the spill. ExxonMobil argued that it had impliedly consented to the assignment; the court held it could not do so because written consent to the assignment was required. ExxonMobil argued that it could choose whether or not to enforce the consent requirement; the Court disagreed. “Under the consent to assign provision … any assignment without written consent is void and not merely voidable.” Exxon elected not to appeal.