In the United States, the department of the navy is the constituted organ of the government for administering the navy. Its sole reason for existence is the possibility of war. The most important office in the navy department, after that of the secretary of the navy, is the office of naval operations. All the other offices in the navy are merely accessory to that one particular office the function of which is the preparation of the navy for war.

The method of naval administration now in force in the United States is the outcome of a gradual development. When the Constitution went into effect in 1789, it contained several references to the navy. Congress was given power to “provide and maintain a navy.” The President was made the “commander-in-chief of the navy” and there was a clause which forbade the States from owning ships of war in time of peace. When, during Washington's administration, the executive departments were organized, there was no navy, and there was no pressing need for one. Congress, therefore, vested the control of the navy in the secretary of war. The frigate Constitution and her sister ships were thus built under the direction of the war department. But the imminent hostilities with France in 1798 revealed the need of a separate executive department for the proper administration of our sea force, and, on April 30, 1798, the bill creating the navy department became a law.