Ten Things That Are Illegal To Have Today, But Were Legal Before 2000.

Used widely as a weight‑loss and athletic supplement, ephedra containing ephedrine was legal throughout the 1990s. In 2004, the FDA banned its sale due to significant health risks including cardiac events and strokes.

These were legal accessories for firearms until March 2019, when federal regulation reclassified them as machine guns after the Las Vegas shooting. Before that, they were sold freely—including nationally until mid‑2010s.

Automatic-opening knives like switchblades were still legal in various states into the 1960s. By 1968 and through the 1970s, federal and state restrictions proliferated. While many states relaxed laws later, possession without exception remains heavily regulated today (and banned in many states).

In the early‑to‑mid 20th century, many powerful drugs like cocaine, heroin, and methamphetamine were legally prescribed for conditions like depression or asthma. By 1970–1971, the Controlled Substances Act had reclassified and banned non‑medical use.

Prior to major reforms in the 1930s and onward, employing children in industrial and farm work was legal and common. By the mid-20th century, nearly all such labor was prohibited under federal laws like the Fair Labor Standards Act—but remnants of legal child labor existed through the 1990s in some agricultural sectors. Today, most such practices are illegal in U.S.

Smoking in U.S. domestic airline cabins was legal until 1988, when first short flights banned smoking, and by 2000 all domestic and international flights to/from U.S. carriers prohibited onboard smoking. Today it’s universally illegal on passenger flights.

Mercury-based fever thermometers remained permitted in many U.S. retail stores into the 1990s and early 2000s. They were gradually banned at state or federal levels due to mercury’s toxicity; many states prohibited sales in the early 2000s. Today retail sale is banned in most jurisdictions.

Federal law banned the sale of lead-based residential paint in 1978, but existing stock and usage persisted into the 1980s and 1990s. In the early 2000s, stricter regulations made possession or renovation with lead paint heavily restricted—and today it’s illegal for new use.

Once commonly sold to line the sides of baby cribs, crib bumpers were finally banned by the Consumer Product Safety Commission in September 2023 after being linked to nearly 200 infant deaths.

Standard incandescent bulbs were widely used and sold up to the 2010s. In August 2023, the U.S. enacted efficiency regulations banning many common incandescent bulbs from retail sale nationally; they’re now illegal for new sale, though existing bulbs are still allowed in use.