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U. S. Senate’s Solution to Customs’ Pocket Knife Grab Passes The House and Senate
The U. S. Senate’s Solution to Customs’ proposal to ban assisted-opening, one-hand-opening and other folding knives has passed in both the House and the Senate.
Next step – the President’s desk!

American Knife & Tool Institute

Washington, DC --(AmmoLand.com)-You can keep and use your folding knives permitted in your state! With today’s vote in the U.S. Senate (and the President’s expected signature of H.R. 2892), the American Knife & Tool Institute has accomplished the seemingly impossible.

Thanks to the help of many AKTI members, supporters, lawmakers and supporting organizations, we have turned the proposed U. S. Custom’s proposed re-definition of switchblades into an effective and sweeping clarification of the Federal Switchblade Act of 1958.

As of today (October 20, 2009), the Homeland Security Appropriations Bill, with Senate Amendment 1447 language still intact, has passed both the Senate and 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 Orrin Hatch of Utah.

The Senate amendment essentially adopted the switchblade exception language which AKTI sponsored in Texas and that was signed by Texas Governor Perry on June 18, 2009. U.S. Customs, thanks to an outpouring of grassroots support and the intervention of more than 20 U.S. Senators concerned about the potential financial devastation to the entire sporting knife industry, became active supporters of the amendment.

AKTI thanks the following co-sponsors for the bi-partisan statesmanship that clearly saved all folding knives which we estimate are 80 percent of current sales in the nearly $1 billion sporting knife industry.

• John Cornyn (R-TX) Mark Pryor (D-AR)
• Orrin Hatch (R-UT) Ron Wyden (D-OR)
• John Barrasso (R-WY) Robert Bennett (R-UT)
• Saxby Chambliss (R-GA) Susan Collins (R-ME)
• Bob Corker (R-TN) Mike Crapo (R-ID)
• Michael Enzi (R-WY) Lindsey Graham (R-SC)
• James Inhofe (R-OK) Jeff Merkley (D-OR)
• Ben Nelson (D-NE) Jim Risch (R-ID)
• Pat Roberts (R-KS) Jon Tester (D-MT)
• John Thune (R-SD) David Vitter (R-LA)

Prior to the Senate adopting the amendment, U.S. Customs also participated in negotiations on language, which they then supported. AKTI thanks both the Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Customs for their ultimate support.

House support has been strong and broad-based during this effort, going back to more than 80 members of the bi-partisan Congressional Sportsmen’s Caucus sending a letter on June 22nd for the industry position to Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano.

Representative Robert Latta (R-OH) and Walt Minnick (D-ID) were staunch, active supporters of the sporting knife industry throughout the entire process in the Senate and the House.

Finally, as H.R. 2892 came back to the House for work in conference, AKTI wants to recognize the support given by various House committee chairs and their staffers.

• David Obey (D-WI) – Chair House Appropriations
• David Price (D-NC) – Chair House Appropriations (Homeland Security Subcommittee)
• Henry Waxman (D-CA) – Chair House Energy and Commerce Committee
• Bobby Rush (D-IL) – Chair House Energy and Commerce Committee (Commerce, Trade and Consumer Protection Subcommittee)
• Charles Rangel (D-NY) – Chair House Ways & Means Committee
• Sander Levin (D-MI) – Chair House Ways & Means Committee (Trade Subcommittee)

As provided in Amendment 1447, U.S. Customs agreed to add 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.”

AKTI expects that the President will sign this bill.

Thank you to all those lawmakers, AKTI members, AKTI Grassroots Supporters, the NRA, the Congressional Sportsmen’s Foundation, and Knife Rights for their support of a campaign that began with an AKTI call to action at the Blade Show on May 29.

About:
AKTI – The American Knife & Tool Institute represents the entire knife community and all knife owners as we have since 1997. We have successfully won every legislative effort so far. AKTI continues its mission to “Keep Knives in American Lives”

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We Stopped Custom’s Pocket Knife Grab

KnifeRights.org

Washington, Dc – -(AmmoLand.com)- The Senate has passed the conference report for the fiscal year 2010 Homeland Security Appropriations Bill with our amendment to the Federal Switchblade Act intact.

The bill will now be sent to the President for signature. There is no indication that he would veto the bill.

This is the culmination of an incredible effort on the part of Knife Rights, American Knife and Tool Institute, NRA, Congressional Sportsmen’s Foundation, Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms and many other organizations who contributed. Each organization made key contributions to the effort, without which the end result might not have turned out so well.

Not many folks gave us much hope of succeeding when Customs first proposed revoking their rulings and redefining what is a switchblade back in May. At a time when bipartisanship is rare as hen’s teeth in Washington, we garnered support from both sides of the aisle.

We succeeded because the coalition of groups that came together to fight Customs represented a broad swath of American industry and grassroots. We succeeded in large part because of YOUR contributions, letters and calls in support of our efforts. You can give yourself a pat on the back for your effort and a job well done against all odds. It is time to pop the cork on that bottle of champagne and celebrate a victory for your knife rights and for all America.

About:
Knife Rights has quickly grown to become America’s largest grassroots knife owners organization. This latest fight against Customs Pocket Knife Grab has validated the power and importance of a dedicated grass roots organization in defending your knife rights. Now we have to finish paying pay for this effort. It took a great deal of money to accomplish all this. Carrying a fight like this to Washington cannot be done without lots of cash. The victory isn’t complete until we pay the bills. PLEASE DONATE TO SUPPORT THIS FIGHT FOR YOUR KNIFE RIGHTS! http://bit.ly/Scvp9

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