page_title: List of battleships of the United States
section_title: Kearsarge class
hierarchical_section_title: List of battleships of the United States / Predreadnought battleships / Kearsarge class
caption_attribution_description: Removed caption read: Photo # NH 61239 &#160;&#160;&#160; USS Kentucky, circa 1905-08 The Battleship USS Kentucky (BB-6), Public domain photo from history.navy.mil
context_page_description: The United States Navy began the construction of battleships with USS Texas in 1892, but the first battleship under that designation would be USS Indiana. Texas and USS Maine, commissioned three years later, were part of the New Navy program of the late 19th century, a proposal by then Secretary of the Navy William H. Hunt to match Europe's navies that ignited a years-long debate that was suddenly settled in Hunt's favor when the Brazilian Empire commissioned the battleship Riachuelo. In 1890, Alfred Thayer Mahan's book The Influence of Sea Power upon History was published and significantly influenced future naval policy—as an indirect of its influence on Secretary Benjamin F. Tracy, the Navy Act of June 30, 1890 authorized the construction of "three sea-going, coast-line battle ships" which became the Indiana class. The Navy Act of July 19, 1892 authorized construction of a fourth "sea-going, coast-line battle ship", which became USS Iowa. Despite much later claims that these were to be purely defensive and were authorized as "coastal defense ships", they were almost immediately used for offensive operations in the Spanish–American War.
caption: USS Kentucky
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