Great Op/Ed by Bart Hinkle on Knife Rights

You can read the article here. 

A certain fellow — we’ll call him Fred — broke the law a while ago. He didn’t mean to. He didn’t even know he was doing it. Nevertheless, had he been caught he could have gone to jail — for a year.

Fred lives in Virginia. Last fall he went on a camping trip. Not knowing what the terrain might be like, he stowed a short machete in his backpack — in case he needed to clear away some stinging nettles, or behead a stray boomslang. In any event, Fred unwittingly committed a Class 1 misdemeanor. Virginia’s concealed-weapons law makes it illegal to carry “hidden from common observation” not just firearms but also dirks, bowie knives, switchblades, razors and a variety of more exotic items usually seen only in poorly dubbed martial-arts movies. The list also includes machetes.

Fortunately for Fred, he has an ally in his corner — a group called Knife Rights, which is like the National Rifle Association but for knives. Last month Knife Rights won a big victory when Tennessee repealed a law prohibiting switchblades. Tennessee followed the lead of Alaska, which legalized them in 2013. Knife Rights was behind both efforts.

Good to see Knife Rights getting some mainstream notice.