California law on automatics

Scott Shiraki said:
Thanks for the info. Let’s hope it passes. I am in my fifties and lived in CA my whole life and never have heard of anyone getting busted for autos.
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Precision Edge Sharpening said:
So I am not in CA, I’m in Mississippi where laws are about as slack as they come but I’ve been wondering what the chances of getting busted are. Like do they just come and search you for knives. I doubt it so if it stays in pocket most of the time, how do they find it. Genuinely curious.
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About 15 years ago, I received a jaywalking ticket in LA. They frisked me. At that time I only had my apartment key on me. A switchblade would have been a one way ticket to jail.

I know several people - mainly construction co-workers - who have been asked or searched for 'weapons'. They were always within the law, but a switchblade would have crushed them. I do know one person who was arrested for one..... they had nothing on her but searched her purse. Found a crappy stiletto and she went to the pokey.

They don't randomly search your house, but if you get stopped for a stupid violation, you never really know.

In LA, you can't openly carry a blade 3" or longer, so no, you can't have a machete there. Same goes for Oakland, Richmond and many other jurisdictions.

State law isn't all that bad, but when you add the city and county codes, it's a horrible mess. Want to be safe in CA? Under 3" folder.

Right to bear arms shall not be infringed..... Unless you live in California.
 
Precision Edge Sharpening said:
So I am not in CA, I’m in Mississippi where laws are about as slack as they come but I’ve been wondering what the chances of getting busted are. Like do they just come and search you for knives. I doubt it so if it stays in pocket most of the time, how do they find it. Genuinely curious.
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They can and do just come up and search you if and when they feel like it, then lie about the circumstances in their report or court testimony if they make an illegal arrest! Other times they will do you a "favor" and just seize your knife and let you go without making an arrest. 4th Amendment protections against illegal search and seizures be damned!
 
Frisco Felon said:
They can and do just come up and search you if and when they feel like it, then lie about the circumstances in their report or court testimony if they make an illegal arrest! Other times they will do you a "favor" and just seize your knife and let you go without making an arrest. 4th Amendment protections against illegal search and seizures be damned!
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Do they? Why? With your "everyone must have guns" and all that jazz.
 
Sure am glad the CHP haven't searched me yet in the half dozen or so times I get pulled over for speeding lol.
 
There are many discussions on the web on "Interstate Commerce" restrictions regarding auto knives. Do the federal laws apply to Interstate transportation of autos if the auto knife is a gift, where here's no "commerce" per say?
 
KJD said:
There are many discussions on the web on "Interstate Commerce" restrictions regarding auto knives. Do the federal laws apply to Interstate transportation of autos if the auto knife is a gift, where here's no "commerce" per say?
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That's a very good question, and one I have asked myself, and tried to find the answer to. More specifically, I wanted to know how the Feds define "interstate commerce" as it applies to switchblades, or anything else. But the paragraph below is all that I was able to find. It's the definition of "interstate commerce" found on the DOJ website.

Based on this definition, it looks to me like "interstate commerce" could mean simply transporting across state lines.

Screenshot 2025-02-01 115620.png
 
KJD said:
There are many discussions on the web on "Interstate Commerce" restrictions regarding auto knives. Do the federal laws apply to Interstate transportation of autos if the auto knife is a gift, where here's no "commerce" per say?
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I'm afraid that paragraph is intentionally written with enough ambiguity to prevent any form of exchange across state lines for fear of prosecution.
 
I Am a 54 year old Los Angeles County Resident. You can legally own and posess any auto knife of any length, I own several. Just cannot carry concealed or open in public unless blade is less than 2" in length. I carry my autos all the time. Have never been stopped let alone hassled by cops ever. And those are my full size autos years now. Carry at your own risk.
 
I live in Indiana where I'm blessed since I can almost carry anything but ive been to Chicago where iirc knife laws are similar to CA. I had to buy a knife small enough to carry. If I were to go to California I'd carry my cobratec cali model that Id hope is legal there since blade length is under 2 inches.
 
It would be fine to carry here. But these laws out here are an antiquated joke unfortunately. I usually carry a 1.9" Lightning OTF..when in doubt.
 
killgar said:
That's a very good question, and one I have asked myself, and tried to find the answer to. More specifically, I wanted to know how the Feds define "interstate commerce" as it applies to switchblades, or anything else. But the paragraph below is all that I was able to find. It's the definition of "interstate commerce" found on the DOJ website.

Based on this definition, it looks to me like "interstate commerce" could mean simply transporting across state lines.

View attachment 2834735
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Interesting. I always thought it was legal to send one over state lines as long as it was going to someone as a gift only and it was shipped using some other service than USPS. Is it legal to send an unassembled kit over state lines? I know it’s not legal to import the kits. Wasn’t sure if that also applied to interstate.
 
Knife_Collector_101 said:
Interesting. I always thought it was legal to send one over state lines as long as it was going to someone as a gift only and it was shipped using some other service than USPS. Is it legal to send an unassembled kit over state lines? I know it’s not legal to import the kits. Wasn’t sure if that also applied to interstate.
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It's my understanding that shipping switchblades across state lines is illegal using any carrier. According to Kniferights, the "common carrier" exemption in the Federal Switchblade act only protects the "common carriers" from prosecution if they unknowingly transport a switchblade across state lines, or if they transport them for the military.

As far as merely transporting switchblades across state lines (like in ones car), I too have wondered if transporting them as a gift was legal. But after reading the Feds definition of "interstate commerce" I don't know. I always interpret the law in a way that most favors the authorities, and least favors the citizenry.

As far as switchblade kits, it's my understanding that the Feds consider an unassembled "switchblade" to be exactly the same as a fully assembled "switchblade". And if kits are illegal to import, then I would assume that they are also illegal to transport across state lines, since I've never seen anything from The Feds to indicate otherwise.

But I don't believe the Feds are looking for people shipping switchblades, assembled or unassembled, and I don't believe for one second that the Feds would prosecute people even if they caught them. Of course if a person were involved in other illegal activity, or the Feds wanted to pressure someone for some reason, then I'm sure the Feds would use whatever they could. But in general I don't think the Feds could care less about switchblades. I know I'm not worried.

On a related point- It's my understanding that in the rare cases where the Feds prosecuted people for violating Federal switchblade laws, that the Feds had given them warnings to stop what they were doing, but the people chose to keep doing it, and the Feds didn't like that. If the Feds contact you and officially tell you to stop doing something, it's a really good idea to stop doing it.
 
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killgar said:
It's my understanding that shipping switchblades across state lines is illegal using any carrier. According to Kniferights, the "common carrier" exemption in the Federal Switchblade act only protects the "common carriers" from prosecution if they unknowingly transport a switchblade across state lines, or if they transport them for the military.

As far as merely transporting switchblades across state lines (like in ones car), I too have wondered if transporting them as a gift was legal. But after reading the Feds definition of "interstate commerce" I don't know. I always interpret the law in a way that most favors the authorities, and least favors the citizenry.

As far as switchblade kits, it's my understanding that the Feds consider an unassembled "switchblade" to be exactly the same as a fully assembled "switchblade". And if kits are illegal to import, then I would assume that they are also illegal to transport across state lines, since I've never seen anything from The Feds to indicate otherwise.

But I don't believe the Feds are looking for people shipping switchblades, assembled or unassembled, and I don't believe for one second that the Feds would prosecute people even if they caught them. Of course if a person were involved in other illegal activity, or the Feds wanted to pressure someone for some reason, then I'm sure the Feds would use whatever they could. But in general I don't think the Feds could care less about switchblades. I know I'm not worried.

On a related point- It's my understanding that in the rare cases where the Feds prosecuted people for violating Federal switchblade laws, that the Feds had given them warnings to stop what they were doing, but the people chose to keep doing it, and the Feds didn't like that. If the Feds contact you and officially tell you to stop doing something, it's a really good idea to stop doing it.
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Seems like they wrote the law in a way that doesn’t allow for much wiggle room. If someone is caught dead to rights, the feds are probably going to use every word in it that works in their favor and not in favor of the defendant.

But yeah, as far as enforcement, it does seem like the kind of thing that only comes up when they’re investigating someone or some business on suspicion of more serious crimes. It could potentially be something they pile onto the charges in cases where they bust a company on something like tax evasion, securities fraud, money laundering, or drug trafficking. In all other cases, it’s likely just a slap on the wrist or warning to cease operation.

So let me ask you this. If you moved to another state with your switchblade collection packed with all your other belongings, could you potentially be violating the federal law by just bringing your collection with you? If they’re legal in the state you moved to, there would obviously be no concerns in that regard. It just seems like the interstate transport thing is where the hang-up is.
 
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Knife_Collector_101 said:
So let me ask you this. If you moved to another state with your switchblade collection packed with all your other belongings, could you potentially be violating the federal law by just bringing your collection with you? If they’re legal in the state you moved to, there would obviously be no concerns in that regard. It just seems like the interstate transport thing is where the hang-up is.
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I really don't know. There might be Federal judges and prosecutors who would say that transporting any switchblade across state lines for any reason is a violation of the law under the Federal definition of "interstate commerce", but I've never seen or heard of such a case. One could only speculate, or ask the Feds, since it's their decision to make.

But I doubt that it's a frequent topic of discussion in the Justice Department.
 
I'm not sure if this is the most current update on this lawsuit but Kniferights.org is suing to have the interstate law on switchblades overturned. The government initially claimed that the law isn't enforced, so no need to do anything about it. I'm sure no one will be surprised that it has, in fact, been enforced somewhat recently.

Knife Rights Sues, AGAIN, to End Unconstitutional Federal Switchblade Act – Knife Rights

kniferights.org kniferights.org

As for any law, I always assume that the government will regard the law in a manner that will be the most aggressive against the citizenry.

I hate how long it takes for these lawsuits to wind their way through the court system. It does appear that the highest court is finally in line with supporting our second amendment rights, but here in California, I'm sure the legislature will come up with something to try and nullify any rulings in favor of us peons.

Since we're here talking about autos, here's my favorite sub 2". It has an ivory inlay, so a double whammy against selling it!

 
Precision Edge Sharpening said:
So I am not in CA, I’m in Mississippi where laws are about as slack as they come but I’ve been wondering what the chances of getting busted are. Like do they just come and search you for knives. I doubt it so if it stays in pocket most of the time, how do they find it. Genuinely curious.
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I've lived in California for about 70 of my 72 years. (Took a job in Iowa for a couple of years back in the 80's.) Lived in the outlying valleys of the Los Angeles area for ~48 of those years and have lived in the city of San Diego about 3 miles from the Mexican border since 1999. San Diego has no knife laws in excess of the state that I know of. And most of the extra knife laws of Los Angeles only apply in the city proper.

In my experience, the police don't just stop you and search you for knives. However, if they stop you for something else, then they may decide a search is necessary. So whether you will be stopped will very much depend on your circumstances at the time of the encounter.

I have had multiple one-on-one encounters with the local LEOs with a knife plainly clipped in my back pocket. Since in those encounters I was not acting suspiciously, nor was I the reason the LEOs were there, they showed no interest in the knife. That said, had they searched me no contraband would have been found.
 
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