22 U.S.C. § 406 — Interference with foreign trade

This section protects ordinary foreign trade from being blocked by the arms-export restrictions elsewhere in this chapter — except for trade the President has already banned by proclamation, or otherwise, under section 401. Nothing in this chapter should be read to reach into, or interfere with, any trade in those same goods — arms and munitions of war, or other listed articles — carried on with any foreign port or place. This protection also covers any other trade that could lawfully have been carried on before June 15, 1917, whether under the law of nations, under a treaty or convention the United States entered into, or under U.S. law.