Ban on switchblades could be next to fall

A federal appeals court’s ruling against Hawaii’s ban on “butterfly knives,” whose blade can be quickly unfolded into a weapon, could fuel a challenge to California’s prohibition on most switchblade knives, which can be activated at the flick of a switch.

Both cases are rooted in the Supreme Court’s June 2022 ruling that declared a right to carry firearms in public, which has led federal courts to strike down numerous state and federal gun control laws. Monday’s decision by the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals was the first to apply the ruling to knives, but it won’t be the last.

Switchblade knives “are widely possessed and used for lawful purposes across much of the country,” lawyers for a group called Knife Rights and three would-be switchblade owners said in a federal court filing in San Diego challenging the state’s ban on automatically opening knives with blades longer than 2 inches.

Citing the Supreme Court’s new standard that any restrictions on guns must be “consistent with this nation’s historical tradition of firearms regulation,” the Knife Rights attorneys said the same standard must apply to knives, and that California’s switchblade law “has no historical pedigree nor justification in the Nation’s history and tradition of arms regulation.”

The appeals court likewise found in Monday’s ruling that knives “fit the general definition of arms” covered by the Second Amendment, which protects the “right to keep and bear arms.” Judge Carlos Bea also said in the 3-0 ruling that although butterfly knives are sometimes used by criminals, they are “commonly owned for lawful purposes” and cannot be banned by a state.

The panel, selected at random from the Ninth Circuit’s judges, consisted of three conservatives and could be overruled if the appeals court, which has a majority of Democratic appointees, orders a new hearing before an 11-judge panel. But the final word could be up to the Supreme Court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority.

In last year’s 6-3 ruling by Justice Clarence Thomas, the court overturned a New York law requiring individuals to show a need for self-defense in order to carry a concealed firearm in public. Similar laws were also struck down in other states, including California, where Democratic legislators are trying instead to enact new gun-licensing standards and bans on carrying firearms in facilities such as schools, government buildings and sports arenas.

The court’s majority on firearms issues is not ironclad. On Tuesday, the justices voted 5-4 to allow the Biden administration to enforce rules on “ghost guns,” which are sold in parts and can be assembled at home, while the restrictions are challenged in lower courts.

The administration is requiring sellers to conduct background checks for purchasers and install serial numbers that can be traced after a shooting. Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Amy Coney Barrett joined liberal Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson in the majority.

But nationwide, according to a study by Pepperdine University law Professor Jacob Charles, more than a dozen state and federal gun laws have been partly or entirely overturned by lower federal courts based on the Supreme Court’s new standard. One of the most far-reaching cases, on firearms possession by perpetrators of domestic violence, is on the high court’s docket.

In March, the Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans cited the high court’s new standard in declaring unconstitutional a 1994 federal law banning gun ownership by anyone who has been found by a judge, in a civil proceeding, to have committed or threatened violence against a spouse or domestic partner. Such findings do not require a criminal conviction, only a judge’s order prohibiting further abuse, and the appeals court said no such laws were part of U.S. history or tradition.

California, which has a similar law, and 22 other states joined the Biden administration in asking the Supreme Court to review the case and overturn the appellate decision. The court agreed June 30 to hear the case in the term that begins in October, with a ruling due by next summer.