46 U.S.C. § 50101
Section 50101 · Objectives and policy
Amended 2 times on record
Applied in 18 court decisions — leading case Novak v. United States (2015)
Most recently applied in Matter of Elizabeth St. Garden, Inc. v. City of New York (June 2024)
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year.Markers show enactment, consequential amendments, and circuit splits over this section — watch for a citation surge after a change or a disagreement. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
(a) Objectives.—It is necessary for the national defense and the development of the domestic and foreign commerce of the United States that the United States have a merchant marine—
(1) sufficient to carry the waterborne domestic commerce and a substantial part of the waterborne export and import foreign commerce of the United States and to provide shipping service essential for maintaining the flow of the waterborne domestic and foreign commerce at all times;
(2) capable of serving as a naval and military auxiliary in time of war or national emergency;
(3) owned and operated as vessels of the United States by citizens of the United States;
(4) composed of the best-equipped, safest, and most suitable types of vessels constructed in the United States and manned with a trained and efficient citizen personnel; and
(5) supplemented by efficient facilities for building and repairing vessels.
(b) Policy.—It is the policy of the United States to encourage and aid the development and maintenance of a merchant marine satisfying the objectives described in subsection (a).
Editorial notes U.S. Code · Office of the Law Revision Counsel
SectionSource (U.S. Code)Source (Statutes at Large) 50101 46 App.:861. June 5, 1920, ch. 250, §1, 41 Stat. 988; Exec. Order No. 6166, June 10, 1933, §12; June 29, 1936, ch. 858, title II, §204, title IX, §904, 49 Stat. 1987, 2016; Pub. L. 97–31, §12(33), Aug. 6, 1981, 95 Stat. 156. 46 App.:891. May 22, 1928, ch. 675, §1, 45 Stat. 689. 46 App.:1101. June 29, 1936, ch. 858, title I, §101, 49 Stat. 1985; Pub. L. 91–469, §1, Oct. 21, 1970, 84 Stat. 1018. This section consolidates the source provisions to eliminate repetition.
Amendments
2009—Subsec. (a)(4). Pub. L. 111–84 inserted “constructed in the United States” after “vessels”.