NAVIGATION LAWS. Historically this expression refers to laws passed at various times and places to restrict commerce to ships of a particular nationality, but, in another sense, naviga tion laws are those which lay down rules of the road and in other ways regulate the actual navigation of ships. With these latter all ships are as a rule required to comply, whatever their nation ality. The two classes will here be dealt with separately, Restriction of Navigation—In England the first Navigation act was passed in 1381, during the reign of Richard II. Policy varied from time to time until the 17th century. Then, in 1651, during the period while Oliver Cromwell was in power, the Navi gation act was passed in order to strike a blow at the maritime supremacy of the Netherlands. The system set up of requiring the national trade by sea to be carried in ships under the national flag was maintained in force (as varied and amended by a number of further statutes) for a period of two centuries. By the Naviga tion acts ships under the national flag were required to be owned by British subjects, and shipmasters, and a proportion of the seamen were also required to be British.
"Under the form the Navigation acts had assumed in 1847 no produce of Asia, Africa or America could be imported for con sumption into the United Kingdom from Europe in any ships, the object being that the trade should be direct and in British bottoms. The whole of the coasting trade of the United Kingdom was restricted to British ships, and the colonial trade was prohib ited to all foreign ships unless under the sanction of a special Order in Council. Various restrictions were imposed on imports except in British ships. Differential dues and restrictions on im portations could be imposed by Order in Council on the ships of any foreign country which imposed similar restrictions on British trade. It is to be observed that, with the exception of restrictions on exportation from this country to certain British possessions, the prohibitions of the Navigation acts were entirely restricted to imports. This necessarily followed from certain important trading
powers having anticipated Great Britain in the enactment of navi gation laws, their refusal to receive our goods except in their own ships preventing the possibility of the British parliament effec tually restricting exportation in this direction." (Pulling.) By an act passed in 1849 (12 & 13 Vict. C. 29) the Navigation laws were repealed, subject to a reservation of the coasting trade, and to a provision, intended to secure reciprocity, whereby, if British ships were subjected in other countries to prohibitions or restrictions, the privilege of the ships of those countries in British ports might be restricted.
Foreign ships were admitted to the coasting trade of the United Kingdom by an act passed in 1854 (17 & 18 Vict. C. 5) the pro visions of which have been re-enacted in the Customs Consoli dation act 1876, section 141.
While the laws restricting trade to national ships have thus long ceased to operate, British Law still provides that a ship shall not be deemed to be a British ship unless owned wholly by British subjects, or by a body corporate established in some part of the King's Dominions. British ships are required to be registered as such (Merchant Shipping acts). Further, by the British Nation ality and Status of Aliens act 1914, an alien cannot be the owner of a British ship, and, by the Aliens Restriction (Amendment) act 1919, no alien may act as the master or as one of the principal officers of a British ship.
In the United States a system of duties discriminating against foreign ships was adopted in 1789. Under various statutes pro vision was made for relief by way of reciprocity, and conse quently, after 1849, British ships were admitted to United States ports on the same terms as. American ships were admitted into British trade, but coastwise trade has continued to be limited to ships of the United States.