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Heartland Patriot wrote:

koolaid wrote:Shortly before the Civil War started, something like 30% of the state population was made up of slaves, and that was before the advancing Union army started leading slave owners from neighboring states to bring them into Texas.

I'm curious to see some sort of census data or something to back up that 30% figure.

The Texas State Historical Association says that in 1850 Texas had 154,000 whites and 58,000 slaves, according to the US Census. It mentions that the 1860 Census had the population up to 600,000 but doesn't break down the race/free/slave status.

The US Census Bureau says 420,000 whites, 355 free black, 182,000 slaves, and 403 Indians. 30% slave is pretty close but I think the 403 Indians is probably a severe under count (using today's terminology).

EDIT: I have to admit not believing the 30% figure either and looking it up out of curiosity. I knew we had slaves enough to make Juneteenth a holiday, but I thought it was much lower than that also.

Heartland Patriot, the potential problem for carrying your knife is not the length. The law only makes longer than 5.5 inches illegal (well, state law - some cities like San Antonio have ordinances the other way). But, the law also forbids carrying bowie knives and does not put a size limit on them. There is a great deal of gray area on this, especially with the law using the lower case "b" instead of upper case. This has generally been interpreted to mean anything in the style of a Bowie knife, including technically those little one inch blade souvenir replicas. Most cops will go with the blade shape of having a clip point and only one edge sharpened. Some might look further at it and some will ignore it. It will really depend on the cop and the individual circumstances, but in any case it is a gray area, IMHO.