Cutter Service Act

Cutter Service Act, 1914 is a United States federal statute authorizing the construction of two revenue cutter vessels as related to medical and surgical relief for American vessel crews engaged in the deep-sea fisheries. The two revenue cutters provided a class of service as a steam-powered vessel encompassing the coastal geography of the Gulf of Mexico and Maine.

The act of Congress emphasized providing otherwise-unobtainable medical services for seamen on board American fishing fleets. It authorized the commandant of the Revenue Cutter Service to "detail for duty on revenue cutters such surgeons and other persons of the Public Health Service as ... necessary."

As a result of the act, many cutter vessels were fitted out as hospital ships and "relieved from the regular duties as normally performed by cutters" to cruise the fishing banks off the U.S. coastlines as floating hospitals.