Place Created: United States
Year Created: 1807
Description: The Act, approved on February 10, 1807, authorized the U.S. President to conduct a comprehensive survey of the nation's coastal areas. The survey aimed to identify islands, shoals, and navigational routes, as well as distances between key coastal landmarks. The act also authorized studies beyond the immediate coastline to support commercial interests.
Categories of Documents:
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the President of the United States shall be, and he is hereby authorized and requested, to cause a survey to be taken of the coasts of the United States, in which shall be designated the islands and shoals, with the roads or places of anchorage, within twenty leagues of any part of the shores of the United States; and also the respective courses and distances between the principal capes, or head lands, together with such other matters as he may deem proper for completing an accurate chart of every part of the coasts within the extent aforesaid.
SEC. 2. And be it further enacted, That it shall be lawful for the President of the United States to cause such examinations and observations to be made, with respect to St. George's bank, and any other bank or shoal and the soundings and currents beyond the distance aforesaid to the Gulf Stream, as in his opinion may be especially subservient to the commercial interests of the United States.
SEC. 3. And be it further enacted, That the President of the United States shall be, and he is hereby authorized and requested, for any of the purposes aforesaid, to cause proper and intelligent persons to be employed, and also such of the public vessels in actual service, as he may judge expedient, and to give such instructions for regulating their conduct as to him may appear proper, according the the tenor of this act.
SEC. 4. And be it further enacted, That for carrying this act into effect there shall be, and hereby is appropriated, a sum not exceeding fifty thousand dollars, to be paid out of any monies in the treasury, not otherwise appropriated.
APPROVED, February 10, 1807.
Citation: An Act to Provide for Surveying the Coasts of the United States; February 10, 1807." Avalon Project, Yale Law School, https://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/coast_survey_1807.asp. Accessed 17 Feb. 2025.
United States