The Abandoned Shipwrecks Act is a United States piece of legislation passed into law in 1988 meant to protect historic shipwreck

Shipwreck

A shipwreck is what remains of a ship that has wrecked, either sunk or beached. Whatever the cause, a sunken ship or a wrecked ship is a physical example of the event: this explains why the two concepts are often overlapping in English....

s from treasure hunters and salvagers

Marine salvage

Marine salvage is the process of rescuing a ship, its cargo, or other property from peril. Salvage encompasses rescue towing, refloating a sunken or grounded vessel, or patching or repairing a ship...

 by transferring the title of the wreck to the state whose waters it lies in.

Background

The Abandoned Shipwrecks Act (Pub. L. 100-298; ), also known as the Abandoned Shipwrecks Act of 1987, was passed into law due to severe damage to some 3,000 historic wrecks on the Great Lakes

Great Lakes

The Great Lakes are a collection of freshwater lakes located in northeastern North America, on the Canada – United States border. Consisting of Lakes Superior, Michigan, Huron, Erie, and Ontario, they form the largest group of freshwater lakes on Earth by total surface, coming in second by volume...

 and other areas of the coast that had been looted, and in some cases ruined, by treasure hunters in the 1970s. One example of this is Mel Fisher

Mel Fisher

Mel Fisher was an American treasure hunter best known for finding the 1622 wreck of the Spanish galleon Nuestra Señora de Atocha named after a shrine in Madrid for protection. He discovered the wreck July 20, 1985...

 and his highly publicized treasure hunting expeditions off the coast of Florida

Florida

Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...

 for the Spanish galleon

Galleon

A galleon was a large, multi-decked sailing ship used primarily by European states from the 16th to 18th centuries. Whether used for war or commerce, they were generally armed with the demi-culverin type of cannon.-Etymology:...

s Nuestra Senora de Atocha and the Santa Margarita

Santa Margarita (shipwreck)

The Santa Margarita was a Spanish ship that sank in a hurricanein the Florida Keys about west of the island of Key West in 1622.Artifacts from the ship are currently on display at the Mel Fisher Maritime Heritage Museum in Key West....

. On April 29, 1988, President Ronald Reagan

Ronald Reagan

Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....

 signed the bill (Abandoned Shipwrecks Act of 1987, Pub. L. 100-298, 102 Stat. 432) into law.

The specifics

The law specifies that any wreck that lies embedded a state's submerged lands is property of that state and subject to that state's jurisdiction if the wreck is determined as being abandoned. The National Park Service

National Park Service

The National Park Service is the U.S. federal agency that manages all national parks, many national monuments, and other conservation and historical properties with various title designations...

 website states that these include:

“abandoned shipwrecks embedded in a State's submerged lands; abandoned shipwrecks embedded in coralline formations protected by a State on its submerged lands; and abandoned shipwrecks located on a State's submerged lands and included in or determined eligible for inclusion in the National Register of Historic Places.”

In section 3, the act outlines what is meant by the use of certain words. In the case of the term "embedded," it states that it...

"...means firmly affixed in the submerged lands or in coralline formations such that the use of tools of excavation is required in order to move the bottom sediments to gain access to the shipwreck, its cargo, and any part thereof."

Also, the term "submerged lands" refers to "lands beneath navigable waters," and "state" delineates "a state of the United States of America, District of Columbia, Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico , officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico , is an unincorporated territory of the United States, located in the northeastern Caribbean, east of the Dominican Republic and west of both the United States Virgin Islands and the British Virgin Islands.Puerto Rico comprises an...

, Guam

Guam

Guam is an organized, unincorporated territory of the United States located in the western Pacific Ocean. It is one of five U.S. territories with an established civilian government. Guam is listed as one of 16 Non-Self-Governing Territories by the Special Committee on Decolonization of the United...

, the Virgin Islands

United States Virgin Islands

The Virgin Islands of the United States are a group of islands in the Caribbean that are an insular area of the United States. The islands are geographically part of the Virgin Islands archipelago and are located in the Leeward Islands of the Lesser Antilles.The U.S...

, American Samoa

American Samoa

American Samoa is an unincorporated territory of the United States located in the South Pacific Ocean, southeast of the sovereign state of Samoa...

, and the Northern Mariana Islands

Northern Mariana Islands

The Northern Mariana Islands, officially the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands , is a commonwealth in political union with the United States, occupying a strategic region of the western Pacific Ocean. It consists of 15 islands about three-quarters of the way from Hawaii to the Philippines...

."

Exclusions

The law does not protect military wrecks (which are always owned by the countries for which they were commissioned) or wrecks that lie on Native American

Native Americans in the United States

Native Americans in the United States are the indigenous peoples in North America within the boundaries of the present-day continental United States, parts of Alaska, and the island state of Hawaii. They are composed of numerous, distinct tribes, states, and ethnic groups, many of which survive as...

land.

Controversies

The act has come under fire due to its ambiguous wording. States make the claim that all shipwrecks that lay embedded in their waters are abandoned and under their jurisdiction. Some people claim that only the 10% most historic of all wrecks belong to states. The confusion has resulted in numerous court cases over ownership and salvage rights of the wreck. Salvers argue that the states need to prove to the public which wrecks are historic and are protected under the act, while the states claim that the salver needs to provide proof of ownership if they are to salvage any parts, sediment, artifacts, etc, of the wreck.

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