true..where the blade "begins" is a pretty grey area.. id say measure the sharp part.. but I feel like many cops would just rest a tape measure against the scales an measure to the tip.... wow..these laws are so stupid..its depressing.
this is the first Ive heard that Texas is pulling that crap..I thought they were pretty pro-gun/knife like us here in Utah!!??
Like a lot of places, Texas has a whole lot of laws that were made by idiots in the long long ago. Some have been repealed, but a lot remain on the books.
It's always been legal to cary a long gun, but open carry of handguns was illegal, and up until a decade or so ago, concealed carry generally wasn't a legal option. I think things started too change as a result of a 1991 mass shooting at a Luby's Cafeteria in Killeen. Rather than usde it as an excuse to ban stuff, people seemed to think that if someone in there had a gun, they coud have put a stop to it before all those people were killed. It took several years (and swapping out Ann Richards for George Bush as governor), but we eventually got "shall issue" concealed handgun licenses, and more recently the right to have a handgun in your car without a license (it was previously allowed only under a vague, undefined "travelling" exception to the prior law).
But while there's been a lot of movement on the right to carry handguns, other than making switchblades legal to own (and carry, subject to the restrictions placed on knives generally), I can't think of any relaxation in knife laws. With cetain exceptions for camping and hunting and stuff like that, it's still illegal to carry anything with a blade over five and a half inches, a "dagger" of any length, a "bowie knife" of any length, and some other stuff. So while you're free to walk around in the People's Republic of Kalifornia with a Battle Mistress hanging strapped to your side, it's a Class A misdemeanor in Texas (fine up to $4000, up to a year in jail, or both), and a felony if you walk into any place that's licensed to sell alcohol (like pretty much any grocery store outside of Texas's remaining dry counties).
As far as determining the lenght of the blade, there's no statutory guidance on what counts as the blade, and I know that at least one appellate court has upheld a conviction for carrying an illegal knife even though the sharpened part was under the legal limit. I'd say it's more likely than not that if a cop arrested someone for carrying an Urban Grudge because it's an "illegal knife" and a jury convicted, the conviction would be affirmed on appeal. It seems to be up to the jury to decide what counts as the "blade," so if a cop arrested, a prosecutor prosecuted, and a jury convicted, I think that more likely than not, the conviction would be upheld on appeal.
It seems a bit strange to me that you can walk around in public with a shotgun or AR-15 (as long as it's not displayed in a manner calculated to cause alarm and not in a place that sells alcohol), but if you leave your property with a TGLB hanging from your belt, you're subject to arrest and up to a year in jail. And you'll never see your knife again, except as evidence at the trial. So I'd say Texas is a relatively gun-friendly state, but relatively knife-unfriendly.
ETA: I'd add to all that that unless you do something to attract a cop's attention, it's unlikely that he'll be puling out his tape measure to see if there's any possible way to measure a blade it that puts it over the legal limit. But I guess some people are better at attracting cops' attention than others, and some are more inclined than others to give the cop a reason to look for something to arrest them for.
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