1800:	Congress forbade citizens to own an interest in vessels engaged in slave trade or serve on such vessels.
1956:	The President signed Public Law 519, which brought all previously uninspected vessels on navigable waters carrying more than six passengers for hire under inspection laws.  These were chiefly party-fishing motorboats, excursion sailboats, and ferry barges.  Public attention had been focused on the inadequacy of existing inspection laws by the hundreds of lives lost in uninspected vessels.