Coast Guard Day

Coast Guard Day is held every August 4 to commemorate the founding of the United States Coast Guard (as the Revenue Marine) on August 4, 1790, by then Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton. On that date, Congress, guided by Hamilton, authorized the building of a fleet of ten cutters, whose responsibility would be enforcement of the first tariff laws enacted by Congress under the Constitution.

The Coast Guard received its present name in 1915 under an act of Congress that merged the Revenue Cutter Service with the U.S. Life-Saving Service, thereby providing the nation with a single maritime service dedicated to saving life at sea and enforcing the nation's maritime laws.

The Coast Guard began to maintain the country's maritime aids to navigation, including operating the nation's lighthouses, when President Franklin Roosevelt ordered the transfer of the U.S. Lighthouse Service to the Coast Guard in 1939. In 1946, Congress permanently transferred the Department of Commerce Bureau of Marine Inspection and Navigation to the Coast Guard, thereby placing merchant marine licensing and merchant vessel safety under our purview.

Finally, in 1967, after 177 years in the Treasury Department, the Coast Guard was transferred to the newly formed Department of Transportation. The Coast Guard was transferred to the new Department of Homeland Security in 2002 as its mission over the years has changed to include drug interdiction and counter-terrorism.

Coast Guard Day is primarily an internal activity for active duty and reserve Coast Guardsmen, civilian employees, retirees, auxiliarists, and dependents, but it does have a significant share of interest outside the service. Coast Guard units throughout the United States usually plan picnics and informal sport competitions together with family and friends on Coast Guard Day. Grand Haven, Michigan, also called Coast Guard City, annually sponsors the Coast Guard Festival the week of August 4.

In addition to celebrating their own day every year, Coast Guard members also participate as equal partners in Armed Forces Day activities.

External links

• Coast Guard Festival