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Cal. PEN § 651

This is the official text of Cal. PEN § 651, part of California’s Penal Code — defines crimes and sets criminal procedure in California.

Not legal advice. This page reproduces the official text of a government statute for reference only. Laws change, and how a statute applies depends on your specific facts. For advice about your situation, consult a licensed attorney in your state.

Official statutory text

It is a misdemeanor for any person to buy, receive, sell, give away, dispose of, exchange or barter any Federal order stamps except for the foods or cotton goods for which they are issued.

This section does not apply to any person buying, receiving, selling, giving away, disposing of, exchanging or bartering any Federal order stamps subsequent to the redemption of such stamps in the manner provided by State or Federal law for the foods or cotton goods for which they are issued.

As used in this section, Federal order stamps refers to stamps issued by the United States Department of Agriculture or its duly authorized agent for food and surplus food or cotton and surplus cotton.

Status: in_force · Read it on the official government site

About this page: Statute text is reproduced from official government publishers via the Open US Law dataset (Vaquill AI, snapshot v2026.08, CC BY 4.0). Primary legislative text like this is public domain under the government-edicts doctrine (Georgia v. Public.Resource.Org, 2020). We link every section back to its official source so you can verify it independently.