Do you have any rights if the Coast Guard boards your boat?

Sorry, but when it comes to Coast Guard boardings, you don’t have any rights.

I’m surprised how many boaters don’t know this. The US Coast Guard can board your boat any time they want, and look anywhere they want, without probable cause or a warrant. They can do this on the open sea, or while you’re asleep aboard in your marina at midnight. They can look through your bedsheets, in your lockers, in your bilges, in your jewelry box, or in your pockets. They can do it carrying just their sidearms, or they can do it carrying assault rifles. They can be polite about it or they can be rude, but mostly they’re polite.

If you’re an avid boater you can expect to be boarded every year or two.


I explain this to my guests aboard Condesa, some of whom are lawyers, and I’m met with disbelief:

“But that’s a blatant violation of your constitutional rights! They need probable cause, or a warrant from a judge!”

“Not on a boat, my friend, not on a boat.”

The U.S. Coast Guard Boarding Policy:

Title 14 section 89 of the United States Code authorizes the U.S. Coast Guard to board vessels subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, anytime, any place upon the high seas and upon any waterway over which the United States has jurisdiction, to make inquires, examinations, inspections, searches, seizures, and arrests. The U.S. Coast Guard does not require a warrant to conduct search, seizures, arrests over any United States Waterway or high seas. The U.S. Coast Guard also have full legal law enforcement power on any land under the control of the United States, as needed to complete any mission.

Sweeping powers. In a paper in the William and Mary Law Review, law scholar Greg Shelton says, “In terms of enforcement power, Coast Guard boarding officers are clearly America's "supercops."”

Another law scholar, Megan Jaye Kight, says, "As such, these provisions comprise what has been accurately characterized as 'one of the most sweeping grants of police authority ever to be written into U.S.  law.'"

If you’d like to know a little more detail about the boarding policy, here’s a longer document, meant for the public, in the Coast Guard’s own words.

And here’s an article by a retired Coast Guard captain and Coast Guard legal counsel. The pull quote kind of says it all: “There are two main ways to board a vessel—either with permission, or without.”
I’ve been boarded by the Coast Guard five times. They’ve always been very polite, and I’ve never resisted, thus incurring the penalty of ten years in prison and a $10,000 fine. They asked permission to board, but since they were going to board anyway no matter what I said, I said yes.

In the post-9/11 world the Coast Guard has added duties, and added weaponry. Instead of a couple of sailors in a rubber boat with big Mae West life jackets and sidearms, a common sight is coasties with assault rifles in high speed inflatables with M-240 machine guns mounted bow and stern. Just the presence of all this weaponry make many nervous or afraid.

I’m not someone who sleeps with a copy of the US Constitution under his pillow, but as “the supreme law of the United States of America,” I take it to be the governing document of my relationship with my government. The first ten amendments to the constitution are called the Bill of Rights, and many have died defending them. Here’s what the Fourth Amendment says:

Amendment IV The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
Over the years and many Supreme Court cases, the Fourth Amendment has been interpreted to mean that without a warrant or probable cause law enforcement can’t search your car, your office, your mountain cabin, your pocket, or your wood shed. According to the Constitution, law enforcement personnel can’t search anywhere in your private universe without probable cause or a warrant issued by a judge.

Except your boat: They can board your boat any time they please and look anywhere they want without warning, warrant, or cause, and they do so every day. This is called a “suspicionless search.”
http://www.sailfeed.com/coast-guard-boardings-and-your-fourth-amendment-rights-part-1

Coast Guard boardings & your 4th. Amendment rights part 2.

Why do they board us and search us, and what are they looking for?

If you ever ask why you, in particular, got singled out from all the boats on the water that day, the boarding officer will say these exact words: “I’m not a liberty to say.” Since there is no requirement for probable cause, it’s impossible to know why you got boarded. It’s just bad luck, or maybe they didn’t like the cut of your jib.

Most of what they’re doing is training. Boarding strange vessels on the high seas is a big part of their job, and our boats are good practice. Many coasties don’t come from a boating background—or certainly haven’t been on a sailboat—and they’ve got learn the ropes.

They’re checking our documentation, safety gear, seeing if we’re drunk, and checking for environmental violations. Are we dumping oil/fuel/sewage into our precious waterways? It’s common to check bilges for oily water, and if there’s an automatic bilge pump in that oily water, we’re so busted.

They’re also checking for fisheries violations, people smuggling, arms smuggling, and drug smuggling. Twenty-six percent of Coast Guard activities are related to drug interdiction, and they are looking for illegal narcotics on every vessel during every boarding.

Considering what we’ve come to expect of our Fourth Amendment rights on land--No, officer, you can’t come in my house and have a look around--suspicionless searches of our boats don’t feel right to most of us. I lived aboard for ten years, and I consider my boat to be my private home. The salons, staterooms, and bunks on our boats are just like our living rooms, bedrooms, and beds at home: Ours, personal, private, and not open for random tours or training missions by strangers.

Some argue that because boats don’t have license plates like cars, the Coast Guard has to board us to check our documentation, but boats either have numbers, a name and hailing port, or both, and these can be seen easily. Any confusion with a boat’s identity can be sorted out by radio or by coming within hailing distance. By the way, the average Coast Guard vessel has advanced optical equipment and digital cameras: When you can barely make out individuals aboard their cutter, they’re reading the numbers off your iPhone.

They’re checking our safety gear (for our own safety, of course) but the police can’t randomly inspect our cars for seat belts, air bags, good brakes, or child seats, nor can they enter our homes to check the gas shut-off, the backflow preventer, or the tags on our mattresses.

Most of us have the right safety gear to protect ourselves and our crew, and most sailors have more safety gear than required: The Coast Guard doesn’t require EPIRBs, radios, LifeSlings, harnesses, jacklines, or any number of items that most sailors consider standard equipment.

They’re protecting the environment, but the police can’t perform random smog checks on cars, or enter our homes to make sure we’re not pouring used motor oil down the bath tub drain.
In short, the justifications for suspicionless searches at sea would never stand up on land, where they would seem downright un-American.
http://www.sailfeed.com/coast-guard-boardings-and-your-fourth-amendment-rights-part-2