Mailman, could it have something to do with the timing of when it's available in the game, specifically for the Americans? Maybe it's one of those things where the better ships aren't available for the Americans early in the game but then the Constitution eventually becomes obsolete.
Not special pre-order but exclusive to certain retailers, like BB. In my post you'll see that it says "the U.S.S. Constitution is available as an in-game download when E:TW is pre-ordered or purchased from Best Buy." I looked at Gamestop just now and they don't show it, didn't see it on the Amazon listing either. It's really hard to tell what the picture shows on the BB website but there is something in the upper right-hand corner that I didn't see in the package pictures on other sites.
On the page linked below CA/Sega show it under Pre Order a Box Copy in Retail but further inspection shows that it doesn't have to be pre-ordered from them, as in the quote in my last paragraph.
A Google search showed that Play.com is supposed to have the exclusive in the UK. I actually noticed that when I was searching for retailers that were carrying the download in general to see if there were any other US retailers.
Source: http://www.totalwar.com/empire/gameinfo/pre_order.php
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