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President Martin Van Buren, Excerpt from Third Annual Message, December 2, 1839.
It will be seen by the report of the Secretary of the Navy respecting the disposition
of our ships of war that it has been deemed necessary to station a competent force
on the coast of Africa to prevent a fraudulent use of our flag by foreigners.
Recent experience has shown that the provisions in our existing laws which relate
to the sale and transfer of American vessels while abroad are extremely defective.
Advantage has been taken of these defects to give to vessels wholly belonging to
foreigners and navigating the ocean an apparent American ownership. This character
has been so well simulated as to afford them comparative security in prosecuting
the slave trade–a traffic emphatically denounced in our statutes, regarded with abhorrence
by our citizens, and of which the effectual suppression is nowhere more sincerely
desired than in the United States. These circumstances make it proper to recommend
to your early attention a careful revision of these laws, so that without impeding
the freedom and facilities of our navigation or impairing an important branch of
our industry connected with it the integrity and honor of our flag may be carefully
preserved. Information derived from our consul at Havana showing the necessity of
this was communicated to a committee of the Senate near the close of the last session,
but too late, as it appeared, to be acted upon. It will be brought to your notice
by the proper Department, with additional communications from other sources.
Source:James D. Richardson, ed. Messages and Papers of the Presidents, 1787-1897,
Washington, D.C., 1898, (vol.3).
