{"id":"01KG8AMJGB7FCZNTGQGKRQ3TEF","cid":"bafkreidcep4lt67u7djpknf2a73awehc7soplbgngd7khostetgp5bjasa","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":11521,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:36.274Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 1","source_file":"01KG89J19NC56FFGBCM2SWEZZY","start_line":11459,"text":"CHAPTER LXXII.\r\n“HEREIN ARE THE GOOD ORDINANCES OF THE SEA, WHICH WISE MEN, WHO VOYAGED\r\nROUND THE WORLD, GAVE TO OUR ANCESTORS, AND WHICH CONSTITUTE THE BOOKS\r\nOF THE SCIENCE OF GOOD CUSTOMS.”—_The Consulate of the Sea_.\r\n\r\n\r\nThe present usages of the American Navy are such that, though there is\r\nno government enactment to that effect, yet, in many respect, its\r\nCommanders seem virtually invested with the power to observe or\r\nviolate, as seems to them fit, several of the Articles of War.\r\n\r\nAccording to Article XV., “_No person in the Navy shall quarrel with\r\nany other person in the Navy, nor use provoking or reproachful words,\r\ngestures, or menaces, on pain of such punishment as a court-martial\r\nshall adjudge_.”\r\n\r\n“_Provoking or reproachful words!_” Officers of the Navy, answer me!\r\nHave you not, many of you, a thousand times violated this law, and\r\naddressed to men, whose tongues were tied by this very Article,\r\nlanguage which no landsman would ever hearken to without flying at the\r\nthroat of his insulter? I know that worse words than _you_ ever used\r\nare to be heard addressed by a merchant-captain to his crew; but the\r\nmerchant-captain does not live under this XVth Article of War.\r\n\r\nNot to make an example of him, nor to gratify any personal feeling, but\r\nto furnish one certain illustration of what is here asserted, I\r\nhonestly declare that Captain Claret, of the Neversink, repeatedly\r\nviolated this law in his own proper person.\r\n\r\nAccording to Article III., no officer, or other person in the Navy,\r\nshall be guilty of “oppression, fraud, profane swearing, drunkenness,\r\nor any other scandalous conduct.”\r\n\r\nAgain let me ask you, officers of the Navy, whether many of you have\r\nnot repeatedly, and in more than one particular, violated this law? And\r\nhere, again, as a certain illustration, I must once more cite Captain\r\nClaret as an offender, especially in the matter of profane swearing. I\r\nmust also cite four of the lieutenants, some eight of the midshipmen,\r\nand nearly all the seamen.\r\n\r\nAdditional Articles might be quoted that are habitually violated by the\r\nofficers, while nearly all those _exclusively_ referring to the sailors\r\nare unscrupulously enforced. Yet those Articles, by which the sailor is\r\nscourged at the gangway, are not one whit more laws than those _other_\r\nArticles, binding upon the officers, that have become obsolete from\r\nimmemorial disuse; while still other Articles, to which the sailors\r\nalone are obnoxious, are observed or violated at the caprice of the\r\nCaptain. Now, if it be not so much the severity as the certainty of\r\npunishment that deters from transgression, how fatal to all proper\r\nreverence for the enactments of Congress must be this disregard of its\r\nstatutes.\r\n\r\nStill more. This violation of the law, on the part of the officers, in\r\nmany cases involves oppression to the sailor. But throughout the whole\r\nnaval code, which so hems in the mariner by law upon law, and which\r\ninvests the Captain with so much judicial and administrative authority\r\nover him—in most cases entirely discretionary—not one solitary clause\r\nis to be found which in any way provides means for a seaman deeming\r\nhimself aggrieved to obtain redress. Indeed, both the written and\r\nunwritten laws of the American Navy are as destitute of individual\r\nguarantees to the mass of seamen as the Statute Book of the despotic\r\nEmpire of Russia.\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 1"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG8AJVA5SMZ8S3QW279SSFPM","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG89J19NC56FFGBCM2SWEZZY","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG89HMDZKNY753EZE1CJ8HZW","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG8AMJGM6BBWE326D5F8TPE0","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:41.483Z","ts":"2026-01-30T20:48:52.512Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}