Hi,

only global administrators and users with the Manage permission for the Friends module can use this check-box (Automatically approve), which creates the requested friendship without the other user's approval; not available on the live site.

To achieve your goal, you could:

1. Grant everyone role with manage permission for Friends module. But this is not suggested.

2. Create a custom webpart, in which you will approve friends automatically using methods from:
CMS.Community.FriendInfoProvider class (e.g. SetFriendInfo method)

Best regards,
Ivana Tomanickova