Getting close to completing my Savage project. While waiting for a seat and some brakes I decided anyway for a test ride.

The bike will not run in gear. Kickstand is in the up position. I went back and followed the kickstand position indicator wire (green and black/white) and checked the connection. Is there a way to bypass this circuit? This is my only guess on what could be the problem. Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

So I'm assuming you got it started, kick stand up, put it in gear and it stalls.  Doesn't serge forward, just dies, more or less electrically.

Once the kick stand is up, it no longer looks at the clutch safety.
So assuming it's the kick stand safety sounds correct.

There's a green 2 wire connector on later models under the seat, pull that and stick a paper clip in to disable it.  And yeah, you could stick a volt meter leads in there to confirm it was working correctly.