as an ensign ("Licensed yachts are required by law to use the American ensign prescribed by the Secretary of the Navy."), and its use as an ensign was reiterated in Treasury Decision 9426 of June 11, 1889 (referring to the "yacht ensign"). While formally licensed yachts were legally required to fly this modification of the national ensign, unlicensed U.S. yachts also started flying this flag as their ensign, too, and eventually the U.S. Navy confirmed that it recognized this practice for all U.S. yachts. In 1939, the Secretary of the Navy approved the ruling of the Judge Advocate General of the Navy "...that a ship of the Navy should return a dip made by a yacht flying the yacht ensign and that the yacht ensign may properly be made the object of a hand salute to be rendered on boarding or leaving a yacht." The legal requirement for licensed yachts to fly the Yacht Ensign that was part of United States statute (46 U.S.C. section 109) was repealed by the Vessel Documentation Act of 1980 (Public Law 96–594), which removed several legal provisions pertaining to the by-then very rare category of "licensed yachts" and treated all documented recreational vessels the same. Nevertheless, owing to its long usage by all U.S. yachts, as well as the fact that the freedom-from-clearance privilege first extended to "licensed yachts" in 1848 had long since been extended to all U.S. pleasure craft regardless of whether they are federally documented or state numbered (see 19 U.S.C. sec. 1441), the yacht ensign is widely flown by many U.S. yachts and pleasure boats in U.S. waters today, continuing a tradition that dates back to the mid-nineteenth century. The states of Arkansas, Maryland, and Washington<ref>[http://www.secstate.wa.gov/flag/boats.aspx Use of the U.S. Ensign and Washington State Flag on Recreational Boats"] from Washington Secretary of State website. Retrieved March 5, 2007.</ref> have each adopted flag protocols which provide that the U.S. ensign "and the U.S. Yacht Ensign, with a canton of 13 stars, are interchangeable on all types of recreational vessels while in national waters." Similarly, the United States Power Squadrons' guide to flags and flag etiquette, prepared in consultation with the Coast Guard, Coast Guard Auxiliary, New York Yacht Club, and others, provides that the Yacht Ensign may be flown as the ensign by U.S. recreational boats of all types and sizes instead of the national ensign in domestic waters, but that