Not all cases the Supreme Court of the United States hears are as dramatic and infamous as Roe v. Wade or Brown v. Board of Education.
But believe it or not, the most recent case the Supreme Court ruled on has put to rest what has been a subtle yet persistent point of contention within U.S maritime law since the nation began. The court has ruled, in a case where Florida resident Fane Lozman argued the city of Riviera Beach could not tow his floating house because it qualified as a home rather than a vessel. Federal maritime law defines a vessel as something capable of being used for water transport. One case regarding what defines a boat cited in the briefs and the opinion is nearly 150 years old.
The court, by a vote of 7-2, sided with the city of Riviera Beach, and Lozman’s floating house was subsequently seized, towed, and ultimately destroyed.
At the same time, Justice Breyer made a point of clarifying the definition of a boat. “Not every floating structure is a ‘vessel,'” he wrote. “To state the obvious, a wooden washtub, a plastic dishpan … or Pinocchio (when inside the whale) are not vessels.”
The ruling actually came as a relief to the American Gambling Association, who didn’t want dockside casinos treated as vessels.
