RE Knife legislation

[thebigspendur]

I just got the following.

October 21, 2009

Late in the day yesterday, the U. S. Senate passed the Homeland Security Appropriations Bill with Senate Amendment 1447 language still intact. The Bill had previously passed the House. This bi-partisan amendment was co-sponsored by 20 U.S. Senators, led by John Cornyn of Texas, Mark Pryor of Arkansas, Ron Wyden of Oregon and Orin Hatch of Utah. The Bill is now on its way to the President's desk for signature.

The Senate amendment essentially adopted the switchblade exception language that the American Knife & Tool Institute sponsored in Texas and that was signed by Texas Governor Perry on June 18, 2009. U.S. Customs, thanks to an outpouring of grassroots objections to their proposed ban and the intervention of Legislators concerned about the potential financial devastation to the entire sporting knife industry, became active supporters of the amendment.

Amendment 1447 adds a fifth clause to section 1244 of the Federal Switchblade Act that exempts "a knife that contains a spring, detent, or other mechanism designed to create a bias toward closure of the blade and that requires exertion applied to the blade by hand, wrist or arm to overcome the bias toward closure to assist in opening the knife."

For more details click through to the American Knife & Tool Institute's website at American Knife & Tool Institute (AKTI) Keeping Knives in American Lives