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Posted on 01/28/2006 6:11:13 PM PST by Copernicus
OPPRESSIVE KNIFE LAWS
by Bernard Levine (c)1998 published in BLADE Magazine
In BLADE Magazine, back in the first half of 1997, I offered a six-part compilation of the many and varied knife laws of our fifty states. But what are these laws really about? Why do we have them? Do they actually do any good?
To me these questions are far more interesting than the details of the laws themselves. Here is how I see the answers.
* * *
> THE LAWS ON THE BOOKS
Nearly every state has knife laws. So does the federal government. So also do countless cities and towns -- except where the state legislature has pre-empted this sort of ordinance, retaining a monopoly for itself.
These knife laws are artifacts of fear -- of prejudice and uncertainty. If you know a little American history, you can look at a knife law's wording, and tell when it was first enacted.
* If it speaks of bowie knives and Arkansas toothpicks, it dates back to the second quarter of the 19th century, to the rapid and sometimes lawless expansion of settlement in the Mississippi River basin.
* If it speaks of concealed dirks and daggers, it dates to the wave of anarchist and pro-German terror bombings around 1915-1918, which frightened an entire generation of Americans into surrendering their liberty.
* If it speaks of switchblades and gravity knives, it dates to the "West Side Story" era of the late 1950s, when the mass media drummed up fear of teen-age gangs, and of violence by immigrant refugees with too many vowels in their names.
* And if it speaks of school grounds, and "dangerous" weapons, it most likely dates to the convulsive expansion of puritanical prior restraint of our own politically correct era.
*
> THE GREAT DIVIDE
Ever since its first European settlements, in the early 1600s, America developed as two completely different republics. We have been politically divided ever since, and will always remain so. This is because our two founding republican traditions are both opposite and irreconcilable.
On one side of the divide were the agrarian republicans like Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. They gave us the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, with their foundation stones of equal creation, personal freedom, and the inalienable rights of every citizen. Theirs was a republic of innate virtue, where crime and vice were nothing more than aberrations. An individual's misbehavior was only of concern to the State when other citizens had been harmed by it.
On the other side of the divide were the puritanical republicans like the autocratic clergyman, Cotton Mather. These men believed all citizens to be innate sinners, irresistibly driven to dastardly deeds unless rigidly restrained by the State. Their puritan republic, their City of God, was like a brittle chain, which a single weak link would sunder. In their world, even the slightest mis-step from pious purity had to be prevented at all cost. Countless detailed laws and regulations were devised, and then constantly revised, in order to eliminate every possibility of straying. To the true puritan -- whether pious Christian, secular humanist, or leveling socialist -- notions of rights and responsibilities are meaningless. All that matters is the prevention of sin. No form of prior restraint can be too severe, if it advances this fundamental goal.
Guess which side gave us our knife laws.
> WHY THEY DO IT
The puritanical impulse is a deep one. We all have it. It is founded in the fear that other people's freedom of action is a threat to our own safety, our own sanctity. It is the impulse to make the other fellow toe the mark.
The puritan knows that his own motives are good, but he does not trust yours. By regulating every detail of everyone else's life, he believes he can prevent crime before it happens. This is so much neater and safer than waiting to punish actual crimes after the fact.
The puritan impulse is the wish to make all risk disappear. This seems much more direct than learning how to manage or avoid risk, and much less demanding than arming oneself to defend against risk. The puritan, like the primitive shaman, seeks to make everything right in the world by magical words of command.
Has it ever worked? Can it ever work? Look at the record -- it has never been successful. Puritanism is, at bottom, simple tyranny, and tyranny is doomed to failure.
But puritanism's unbroken record of failure will not stop people from trying again and again. Every new generation is born with faith in the power of magic words -- written laws -- to prevent sin. And every American generation for the past century and a half has produced its own new wave of oppressive and futile knife laws.
> THE RATIONALE OF REPRESSION
No one but a puritan would imagine that a particular TYPE of knife, lying in a drawer in someone's private home, should be construed as a crime. "Some knives are just inherently dangerous," said a New York state senator in 1958 -- a sentiment often echoed since then. To a puritan this is self-evident truth. To an agrarian it is poppycock. Here is why the two outlooks are so different.
An agrarian republican recognizes that other people are his equals, no better and no worse. Curtailing another man's freedom does not enhance one's own, but merely encourages the other man to return the "favor," in a descending spiral of mutual repression.
But to a puritan, on the other hand, repression is the whole point of law and government. Without repression there would be chaos. Then sin would prevail, and we would all go to hell in a handcart.
The agrarian republicans, when they were in power back in the 1780s, generously extended their 'live and let live' philosophy to every citizen -- including even their puritan opponents. Since that time, the puritans have made full use of this grant of liberty, to enact all the tyrannical regulations and prior restraint that they desired. And they generously extended their increasingly oppressive rule to every citizen -- including of course the agrarians. For the puritans it was a 'heads I win, tails you lose' proposition. To this day, the few remaining agrarians have never figured out what hit them.
But puritans can be selectively tolerant -- in their own distinctive way. They insist upon extending their repressive laws to people who disagree with them. But they generally exempt one small group from all of their laws and rules -- namely their own leaders. I guess the theory must be that their leaders are so exalted and pure, that their foibles are not really sins at all. Their transgressions will not endanger the community, the way yours or mine would. This was just as true in William Bradford's Plymouth and Cotton Mather's Boston, as it was three centuries later in Joseph P. Kennedy's Boston and Adolf Hitler's Berlin, and as it is today in Bill Clinton's Washington.
A gravity knife is similar to a switchblade in that the blade can be opened one-handed with no resistance, then locked into place, but is not spring loaded like a switchblade. A flip of the wrist will do it.
Thumb assists and cutouts in later blade designs have rendered the average larger folding knife similarly amenable to rapid deployment, and without the excess movement.
Any well-made modern knife with a thumb-hole or tab can be opened one-handed as quickly and easily as a switchblade
I think you would be ok ... except that all "weapons" are pretty much prohibited subject to allowable uses.
New Jersey prohibits "slingshots" by name [no differentiation between a David versus Goliath type and a wrist rocket.]
The origins of this goofy law according to legend are a legislator's attempt to prohibit something called a "slungshot" which is something like a "blackjack" which is a padded device holding a heavy weight used to bonk someone on the head. This particular statesman misspelled "slungshot" and ever since a slingshot has been considered a threat to society that can only be possessed by criminals.
How long does it take to become a "a pretty good shot with an atlatl?" :
When I lived in Virginia, I asked the commonwealth's attorney for the legal definition of a concealed weapon. He mailed a copy of the statute.
I recall a slingshot being included, but now am wondering if it actually said "slungshot" since I am sure I have seen that word somewhere.
BTW, there were a lot of exceptions in the Virginia law which would have allowed a surprisingly large number of people to carry.
No more Brent Kimberlins. Bombers should never be pardoned. Presidents who do pardon them should be flayed, flensed and cast into the fields for the wild dogs to eat.
And that's just for starters!
Frankly, once you've missed being "bombed" you develop a clear-cut aversion to the idea that bombers should be allowed to run loose.
How do you develop a clear cut test to separate potential bombers from ordinary citizens and prevent them from "running loose"? Lord forbid that in allowing citizens to 'run loose' we encourage mad bombers to do so.
Should we conservatives institute repressive laws on concealed weapons in order to insure that mad bombers can't run loose carrying? -- [or am I making a too-casual analysis of your ideas about the situation?]
I do not care to attempt to differentiate "potential bombers" from the real thing.
Yep, - its becoming apparent that you want repressive laws to control those 'running loose'..
Just catch 'em. Toss 'em in the clink. Throw away the key.
Hey, it worked for Stalin, so why not here?
No more Brent Kimberlins. Bombers should never be pardoned. Presidents who do pardon them should be flayed, flensed and cast into the fields for the wild dogs to eat. And that's just for starters!
Ya gotta love that authoritarian socialist mindset..
But what about the Declaration of Independence?
Frankly, it's pretty obvious you are trying to raise an argument where there is none, but if you want to step over the edge of the planet and start defending bombers, go right ahead. That'll put you in company with Algore and Billzo Clinton.
Frankly, it's pretty obvious you are trying to raise an argument where there is none --
At # 29 you initiated an argument about the article:
"-- doubting the "conclusions" in such pieces ~ not necessarily the "facts" or "factoids", but the secondary results of too-casual analysis of the situation.
Frankly, once you've missed being "bombed" you develop a clear-cut aversion to the idea that bombers should be allowed to run loose. --"
Now you're claiming I'm defending bombers:
"-- but if you want to step over the edge of the planet and start defending bombers, go right ahead. That'll put you in company with Algore and Billzo Clinton. --"
Get a grip. I'm arguing against oppressive laws, you're arguing for them.
Please support our Hobbit Hole Pocket knives for the troops project.
FR thread here: Help us support our troops! [Knives for Soldiers] Update: 1,000 shipped to date and counting!
Yep, knife laws are stranger than gun laws, if you can believe that. There are lots more ill-defined and contradictory laws out there, because each little podunk town writes their own, to give cops more tools to hassle people. Usually the cop just takes your knife, and adds it to his collection. Actual prosecution requires them to read the statute, and try to make enough sense of it to stand up in court. That rarely happens.
Our Hobbit Hole knife count stands at 1095, which includes pocket knives, sheath knives, rescue knives, entry tools, and a couple of tomahawks. That doesn't include a few dozen "oddball" knives that I got on sale, but in numbers too small to put on the "tote board". I'm always looking out for great knives at great prices.
Those great prices are out there, at times. Sometimes just a good sale from some dealer. We also have great factory support from Gerber and Camillus.
We'll be offering a super-neat tactical switchblade (when presented with the proper paperwork) from Camillus, once it's available. I have the official pricing and photos, but I'm sworn to secrecy until it's formally announced. There are plenty of great assisted-openers out there that can do the same job for less money, and less hassle.
I've carried a pocket knife for the last 36 years (got my first one in Basic when I realized it was a vital accessory), under the theory that a knife is the one tool you cannot beg, borrow, or steal on a moment's notice. You can find a screwdriver, pliers, etc. somewhere, but if you don't have your own knife, you're SOL. So I carry my little Swiss Army knife with the 1GB USB drive, on my keyring. In my pocket is this knife, with the law-friendly 1-7/8-inch blade:
There's usually an active "donate to the troops" thread running over there.
Huh - I don't know about it but winmag might!
Thank you for your efforts in support of a noble cause.
A good flensing would have been good for Brent and good for America too!
When it comes to bombers, an oppressive law is a good thing.
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