Skip to main content

About LII / Get the law / Find a lawyer / Legal Encyclopedia / Help Out

36 USC § 40103 - Purposes

USCPrelim is a preliminary release and may be subject to further revision before it is released again as a final version.

Current through Pub. L. 113-99. (See Public Laws for the current Congress.)

The purposes of the corporation are as provided in the articles of incorporation and include a continuing commitment, on a national basis, to—

(1) preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States and the laws of the States;

(2) commemorate the wars, campaigns, and military actions of the United States to reflect profound respect, high honor, and great tribute on the glorious dead and the surviving veterans of those wars, campaigns, and actions and to give all Americans a greater understanding of and appreciation for the sacrifices of those who participated in them for all Americans;

(3) stimulate to the highest degree possible the interests of the entire Nation in the problems of veterans, their widows, and orphans;

(4) cooperate to the fullest extent and in a harmonious manner with all veterans’ organizations in common projects designed to serve the interests of all veterans of all wars in which the United States has participated;

(5) collate, preserve, and encourage the study of historical episodes, chronicles, mementos, and events pertaining to the wars, campaigns, and military actions of the United States;

(6) inculcate an enduring love of country, a deep and abiding sense of patriotism, and a profound commitment to Americanism among all the people of the United States;

(7) encourage, among the youth of our Nation, respect for our national flag, our anthem, and the traditions of America;

(8) preserve the freedoms of all the people, national peace, prosperity, tranquility, good will, the permanence of free institutions, and the defense of the United States;

(9) foster the association of veterans of the Catholic faith who have served in the Armed Forces of the United States;

(10) encourage morality in government, labor, management, economic, social, fraternal, and all other phases of American life;

(11) promote the realization that the family is the basic unit of society;

(12) increase our love, honor, and service to God and to our fellow man without regard to race, creed, color, or national origin; and

(13) function as a veterans’ and patriotic organization as authorized by the laws of each State in which it is incorporated.

The purposes of the corporation are as provided in the articles of incorporation and include a continuing commitment, on a national basis, to—

(1) preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States and the laws of the States;

(2) commemorate the wars, campaigns, and military actions of the United States to reflect profound respect, high honor, and great tribute on the glorious dead and the surviving veterans of those wars, campaigns, and actions and to give all Americans a greater understanding of and appreciation for the sacrifices of those who participated in them for all Americans;

(3) stimulate to the highest degree possible the interests of the entire Nation in the problems of veterans, their widows, and orphans;

(4) cooperate to the fullest extent and in a harmonious manner with all veterans’ organizations in common projects designed to serve the interests of all veterans of all wars in which the United States has participated;

(5) collate, preserve, and encourage the study of historical episodes, chronicles, mementos, and events pertaining to the wars, campaigns, and military actions of the United States;

(6) inculcate an enduring love of country, a deep and abiding sense of patriotism, and a profound commitment to Americanism among all the people of the United States;

(7) encourage, among the youth of our Nation, respect for our national flag, our anthem, and the traditions of America;

(8) preserve the freedoms of all the people, national peace, prosperity, tranquility, good will, the permanence of free institutions, and the defense of the United States;

(9) foster the association of veterans of the Catholic faith who have served in the Armed Forces of the United States;

(10) encourage morality in government, labor, management, economic, social, fraternal, and all other phases of American life;

(11) promote the realization that the family is the basic unit of society;

(12) increase our love, honor, and service to God and to our fellow man without regard to race, creed, color, or national origin; and

(13) function as a veterans’ and patriotic organization as authorized by the laws of each State in which it is incorporated.

Source

(Pub. L. 105–225, Aug. 12, 1998, 112 Stat. 1329; Pub. L. 109–284, § 5(6),Sept. 27, 2006, 120 Stat. 1212.)

Historical and Revision Notes
Revised Section	Source (U.S. Code)	Source (Statutes at Large)
40103
36:2603.
Aug. 17, 1984, Pub. L. 98–382, § 3, 98 Stat. 1343.

Before clause (1), the word “objects” is omitted as included in “purposes”.

Amendments

2006—Par. (13). Pub. L. 109–284substituted “laws of each State” for “laws of the each State”.

The table below lists the classification updates, since Jan. 3, 2012, for this section. Updates to a broader range of sections may be found at the update page for containing chapter, title, etc.

The most recent Classification Table update that we have noticed was Friday, May 3, 2013

An empty table indicates that we see no relevant changes listed in the classification tables. If you suspect that our system may be missing something, please double-check with the Office of the Law Revision Counsel.

How To Use

Multiple entries for a section are listed most recent first, within the section.

The Session Year indicates which session of Congress was responsible for the changes classified. The Congress number forms the first part of the Public Law number; each Congress has two sessions.

Abbreviations used in the Description of Change column:

An empty field implies a standard amendment.
"new" means a new section or new note, or all new text of an existing section or note.
"nt" means note.
"nt [tbl]" means note [table].
"prec" means preceding.
"fr" means a transfer from another section.
"to" means a transfer to another section.
"omitted" means the section is omitted.
"repealed" means the section is repealed.
"nt ed change" and "ed change" - See the Editorial Classification Change Table [pdf].

The Public Law field is linked to the development of the law in the Thomas system at the Library of Congress.

The Statutes at Large field is linked to the text of the law, in the context of its volume of the Statutes at Large, at the Government Printing Office. Please note that it takes a while for these pages to get posted, so for very recent legislation, you need to look at the "enrolled" version at the Thomas site.

The Statutes at Large references have been rendered in the format used as page numbers in the Public Law web pages to which we link, to facilitate copy-paste into browser "find on this (web) page" tools. We are still working on a more direct link facility.

For serious comparison work, we suggest copying all or a portion of the Public Law text into your favorite text editor, for convenient content traversal and window control.

Sections with change type "new" are a special case, still under development. All are now listed, at the title level only.

You will find that occassionally a specific update you notice in a Public Law listed in a classification table will already have made it into the Code. We assume this is an artifact of the LRC edit process. The LII does not edit the LRC content.

General Reference

Refer to the LRC (Law Revision Council) for explanations about the US Code from the folks who put it all together.

You can look for information about what it is and is not, which titles are positive law, the schedule of Supplements, etc. Under download you can find the source data we use here (GPO locator files), as well as, PDF files that look just like the paper books (these may be rather large).

Refer to the Thomas site for changes that have not yet made it into the classification tables.

36 USC	Description of Change	Session Year	Public Law	Statutes at Large

LII has no control over and does not endorse any external Internet site that contains links to or references LII.