The Costs of Standing Strong

We had one last school board meeting as the school year ended. Our board meetings are typically in two parts. There’s a work meeting, and a few days later an official board meeting. These are usually on the first or second Monday/Thursday or Thursday/Monday combination of the month. This month these were June 13 and June 17.

Cy-Fair ISD board meeting Monday, June 17, 2024
screenshot from here

At last Thursday’s work meeting, June 13, I expected the major discussion to be related to changing the library book removal policy, because of activity in social media. I read through the proposed language and felt pretty good about it, although I had a couple of questions.

What happened at the Thursday meeting, however, was a lot of hubbub about the removal of certain chapters from textbooks before approving them for purchase in the district. This related to a vote taken at the previous board meeting, in May. I wrote about this in some detail then. And I made a prediction that has so far come true:

You can assume that the loud cohort will scream again, at the next board meeting, and the one after that…. Tolerating their tantrums is going to be one of the costs of standing up to them in order to stop allowing them to indoctrinate our kids.

And so it goes.

The Curriculum Selection Complaint

At the work session, a teacher who had been on the curriculum selection committee, specializing in earth science, filed a formal complaint against the board for violating policy by not rubberstamping the recommendations of the committee. She spoke, along with her lawyer.

The complainant (and the hoard of others complaining) failed to note that the board is instructed to use to committee to vet and select materials to be used; it does not say the board has to purchase all the materials recommended.

There was a point at which the board member who had moved to remove the particular materials last month, Dr. Natalie Blasingame, disagreed that a National Geographic text was the gold standard; she would have preferred a different text (a different text that was also approved by the SBOE, but that this committee did not select). She did not push to have her choice used instead; she limited her request to only those texts selected by the committee—and then asked for removal of particular chapters. It’s not clear to me whether the Board has the power to choose SBOE-approved books beyond what is recommended by the local committee, but the fact is they didn’t attempt to do so.

CFISD Board Vice President Dr. Natalie Blasingame
screenshot from here

During the discussion, the complainant and her lawyer both admitted that the board indeed had the authority to act as they did; in other words, they did not violate the policy the complaint claims they violated.

That should end the issue. But with these people, nothing but getting their way will do.

During the Thursday work session, we learned more details about what was being removed. One thing we learned was that it wasn’t Dr. Blasingame’s preference to remove entire chapters. She would have been satisfied with particular paragraphs being removed. However, the books could only be provided on a chapter-by-chapter basis. This means that, for students, those chapters will not be available to them for reading.

But what about the TEKS (Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills)? That was the insistent question. How are they going to learn materials required of them in annual testing, if they can’t get to these materials?

The short answer is, the same way they always have: by whatever means the teachers bring it to them.

To begin with, none of the problematic material is part of TEKS. There are, however, TEKS items in the removed chapters. But the way most classrooms work is not by simply having students read the textbook and then discussing and testing. In fact, only occasionally will the students be assigned reading from the texts (which are digital online copies, not physical books, by the way). Much of the material—including material coming from the texts—is presented in class by the teacher, with supplementary materials, graphs, charts, data, stories, etc., along with activities, labs, etc.

The teachers can use the full textbooks as a resource, just as they normally would; they just can’t present the problematic materials. So the hue and cry about all the extra work of creating curriculum is irrelevant. There was a complaint that teachers couldn't prepare and were way behind in their lesson plans, because of this unsureness about materials—except that it has been known, since last month, what was the minimum available, and there was no reason not to go ahead and lesson plan.

One item mentioned in the May meeting was “depopulation.” The complainant said she had done a search of all the material, and that word was not even used. However, when the problematic section was read last Thursday, the idea that humans are harmful to the planet and we need fewer of them was clearly there—and that is something this community does not want indoctrinated into our students.

In a private online forum, a participant tells this:

started reading some of the chapters that were removed from the science books.  ~98%+ of the material is fine however when you get to the statement saying we're all gonna die if we don't stop using fossil fuels you can see why people had an issue with the content…. Please show me the empirical peer reviewed study that proves that we're all gonna die if we don't stop using fossil fuels. It is not science.

My guess is he’s not directly quoting from the text, but we’ve all read similar assertions from the “mankind is bad for the planet” faith viewpoint. It doesn’t coincide with science—and is even less something you could call settled science. Why did it pass with the SBOE? You’ll have to ask your SBOE representative. Ours has made a point of telling school boards that they didn’t have to accept a text just because the statewide board approved it. They could and should make local decisions.

There was another example of vaccines. There’s a concept, new to me, called “phenomenon-based instruction.” It appears to me to mean that concepts are taught using particular event, a phenomenon, possibly from the news. The phenomenon in this particular section of the textbook was COVID-19. So when the concept of vaccination comes up, we’re not dealing with actual vaccines (remember, they had to change the definition of vaccine to apply the word to the COVID-19 jab). We are not dealing with something that causes immunity, reduces spread, or even necessarily lessens the intensity of the virus. And we’re taking on serious risks by taking this non-vaccine non-helpful intervention. All that aside, when a chapter (in that context) states flatly that vaccines save lives, even that is questionable, which board member Todd LeCompte pointed out. (There’s a clip here.) Which vaccines have saved lives? What is the evidence? We used to have maybe three required. Now there are over 70 required. And since the rise in required vaccines, there is a dramatic rise in autism (from 1/10,000 children to 1/36). Is the link between autism and increased vaccination causal? There are people who think so. Which means it is not settled science, and to state it as if it is fact does not increase the critical thinking of our students; it uses authority to stop them from critically thinking.

There was a fair amount of attack on the board for not being the experts, and that they ought to defer to the experts. First of all, Dr. Blasingame is an expert. Second, teaching is not rocket science (even when you’re teaching rocket science). We members of the community can read the material and see clearly what ought not to be there. We’ve seen it before; we’ve put the requests to remove it from schools in our platform and have accomplished some legislation.

And I’ll just mention here, anyone who graduated from high school ought to be able to understand with sufficient clarity any materials used in K-12. The expertise is almost always about how to manage a factory-style group of students, not how or what information to pass along to students. And, I don't want to overstate this, but I’ve been a textbook writer—biology was one. Textbooks are collections of knowledge, for convenience. And some are worthwhile. But every important concept can be taught without a textbook, maybe better than with one, as our teachers already know.

The opponents are claiming the removal of the materials is censorship. It is a decision not to buy materials that the board—and the community that voted them in—find objectionable and untrue. Censorship is the refusal to have certain ideas heard, often true ideas. A student’s speech can be censored, for example. A guest speaker could be censored by being uninvited or shut down through the heckler’s veto. Materials not used are not censored; they are simply not chosen as the materials to use.

The Pre-Purchase Review of Books

There was another issue at the meeting that drew attention of the media, again questioned by board member Julie Hinaman. It related to an update in the policy for acquiring library materials. There’s a 30-day window for the public to review what is being considered for purchase. Again, anything not chosen is money not spent, not books being censored. But the “they’re denying books for our students” crowd are really upset that they can’t put everything they want, not just before their own children, but before all the children. This includes pornography, which they are claiming is valuable for some of our “diverse” students. Anyone who claims pornography should be provided to minors ought to be labeled a child predator. Let’s be clear on what they’re wanting to do to our kids.

Anyway, there’s a proviso that the books would be listed for the board members five days before the list goes public for that 30-day window. As the board counsel explained, the intention was a courtesy to the board. If they are going to receive complaints about books on the list, it would be helpful to them to be aware of the books a little ahead of time. Since the books aren’t yet purchased, it is only the names of the books being provided to the board; they would still have to seek them out themselves to read or learn about them, which can take time. There is no provision for board members to remove books from the list prior to that 30-day public window. (There’s a clip of this exchange here.) But that is what they were being accused of—having some backroom mechanism for influencing the list before the public even sees it.

CFISD Board member Julie Hinaman
screenshot from here

There’s an awful lot of uproar about this supposedly rogue board depriving students of their educational opportunities. We will have to continue to disagree on this—because we worked very hard to elect a board that would finally be responsive to the community, to stop the sexualizing agenda, the SEL and DEI agendas—the agendas pushed by teacher unions and other nefarious moneygrubbing tyrants who have been working for decades to dumb down our kids while claiming they’re the ones caring for the children.

The Organized Opposition

You might not be aware of the organizing of the opposition—trying to make themselves look like a vast majority. I use the word “organized” in the sense of “community organizing,” as in Obama's life work. There are going to be several organization names. One of them is Cypress Families for Public Schools. Board member Julie Hinaman (the lone opposition on the board) belongs to this one. A number of names you would recognize from the public comments and citizen participation each month belong to this group.

When reducing the number of campus librarians became part of the budget discussion last month—at the suggestion of school principals, as a way to handle the budget deficit—there was another organization formed, recruiting people by telling them librarians were being fired (not true), and campus libraries were being closed (also not true), so they could recruit more anti-board furor. I believe the group is CFISD Parents for Librarians. I think parents joined thinking it was an open forum and a way to support libraries (the policy for which they were not being told the truth). But it has been used as a recruitment to the board opposition (i.e., opposition to the majority of voters who elected this board purposely intending to repair the damage over the past two decades from the previous board members). Here’s an example of the ugliness our board members are getting thrown at them in this group:

If we want to protect librarians, teachers/staff, and CFISD, we GOTTA also understand just who is governing our district, their history, their intentions and agenda, and the company they keep.

After the meeting last night, Christian Nationalist extremist trustee Lucas Scanlon said to a community member that he felt the public comments were "mean." Oh, REALLY?!?!

The poster goes on to make multiple accusations against Scanlon, and his wife, Bethany. I am in multiple groups with Bethany (an excellent source on the library books we’d like removed). She often shows examples of these people telling lies about her. I see her defending herself and her husband; I do not see any “vile” or “mean” posts against such persons as this poster—ever.

After my blog post on last month’s meeting, the opposition let me know—because I’d mentioned an email exchange with the board president in which I asked about the ad hominem attacks from the citizen participants, the entirety of the brief contents I had stated—that they were doing a freedom of information request (I’m unsure of the specific title for such a request in our district) to obtain all such correspondence between me and the president, and I’m assuming between him and any other citizen. This is an attempt to intimidate. Fortunately, there’s nothing to see there. But it’s also a warning to all board members to avoid any written exchanges with citizens, despite their board emails being available on the website for the purpose of open communication with the community. Every correspondence is likely to be construed as collusion.

We heard from former board president (whom we voted out), Bob Covey, earlier in the meeting. The Houston Chronicle caught a photo of him later in the meeting, yelling at the board, out of turn. Board counsel threatened to remove him from the meeting (and he did leave). Because I listened online, I missed the outburst; it didn’t get picked up on the microphones, so what he yelled was not in the transcript. But the lack of decorum is astounding.

Former CFISD board president Bob Covey, who had spoken earlier,
yells at the board before leaving. Photo from Houston Chronicle.

A couple of years ago we had similar (but less vile) disruptions from our side—when we were not allowed to voice our opinions. But these people are being heard. In fact, they organized well enough to fill up the entire slate of citizen participation, leaving supporting citizens no time to speak.

Texas House Rep. Jon Rosenthal also spoke. He accused the board of violating the open meetings act by colluding behind the back of Julie Hinaman last month, because the other board members were ready —after a month of study following the April meeting—to vote to remove those chapters and she was not. Hinaman was clearly blindsided by that vote. But if she had spent her time using that extra month to read the materials, she could have predicted what would be problematic to the rest of the board. The board meeting’s conversation (I think this was in Thursday’s work session) made it obvious Dr. Blasingame had spent plenty of time discussing openly her concerns and how to handle them with Dr. Macias, the curriculum director for the district. Others were present during those conversations. It wasn’t something that happened in the darkness of some secret board meeting that excluded Julie Hinaman.

book cover image from Amazon.com

There’s another organization that might be behind some of what’s going on. This is a rabbit hole I went down last night, after a conversation with a friend who had attended Monday’s board meeting. She saw two separate community members carrying a book called We Are Indivisible. It’s written by the founders of a group called Indivisible.org. In a 2017 interview with one of the founders, Ezra Levin, he says the movement started during a Thanksgiving break in an Austin, Texas, bar, shortly after the election of Donald Trump in 2016. He and his wife, Leah, came up with a 23-page document laying out a strategy for political activism, which got boosted by such pro-tyrannists as Robert Reich and George Takei. He relates:

As former congressional staffers, Leah and I decided in that bar to write a guide aimed at demystifying the congressional policy process and copying the Tea Party strategies and tactics (minus the racism and violence).

Isn’t that sweet. Just like us tea partiers—minus the absolutely nonexistent “racism and violence.” Except maybe adding in the anti-racism version of racism, maybe along with some violence, or at least obstructionism in the style of Cloward and Piven. And fundraising—they do a lot of that, unlike our local tea party, which has never handled money at all, and doesn’t organize any protests ever. (We do learn about the legislative process and share information with each other, and freely contact our legislators.) And they add in a whole lot of lying, because you can’t recruit people to such causes by telling the truth about them. They’re very much about killing the preborn—that’s a priority above almost all else.

They have collaborated with Organizing for America, MoveOn, Working Families Party, and Planned Parenthood, among others, to “stand strong against the Trump Administration’s racist, misogynistic, and broadly bigoted agenda.” So, just like the Tea Party—except the exact opposite in every conceivable way.

There are thousands of Indivisible groups, according to Levin. And I am told there is a group in Katy, Texas, aiming particularly at the County DA race, to oppose the Republican, Dan Simons, and put in the radical tyrant who primaried out the Democrat DA, Kim Ogg, because she wasn’t willing to put all the violent felons back out on the streets. Rep. Rosenthal and one other speaker hinted that we’re going to find out in November (in a year when the school board is not on the ballot) just how much trouble we’re in. I think this means they are targeting every Republican near us who is on the ballot.

So this is the enemy army we are up against. These are the ones using social media to lie about what is actually happening in our school board. They are setting their sights on every political race. They will be showing up—with signs already made—at every possible event. And they are calling the media to be there, telling their side of the story to any willing-to-be-partisan reporters.

Stand with Our School Board Heroes

I will note that the school board positions are unpaid. What they are going through is likely to give anyone pause before signing up to run in the future. But we can thank them for being heroes—to our community and to our kids.

There’s no board meeting in July—except a “special called board meeting” on July 23; I don’t know what that is about (no agenda posted yet). The next official meetings are the work session August 3 8 and regular board meeting August 7 12. [Apologies for the error; I thought I was looking at the coming 2024-2025 year, but I was mistakenly looking at the 2023-2024 schedule.] All are at 6:00 PM, in the board meeting room of the Henry Administration Building.

These are not times in which you can sit back and trust that all will go well. In August, you might want to put the next meeting on your calendar, so you can show up to support these brave board members.

Goings and Comings

There are some things we ought to have a conversation about in theoretical form, ahead of too much emotion or time pressure. We’ll cover a couple of those today.

A University of Texas class photo
in the shape of Texas, 2013
found here

Texit

Texas is a bit different from other states. Texas was an independent nation, not a colony or territory, before joining the United States. And it has kept the notion that it has the right to return to being an independent nation.

Let’s be clear about this: joining the United States means pledging allegiance to the republic of the United States of America, “one nation under God, indivisible.”

Very much like entering into a marriage covenant, this contract to unite with the other states—and “state” means a self-governing sovereign entity; it is not a province—is intended to be permanent. Most countries think of themselves as a state—a sovereign nation. Here in America, the United States is a state, applying that meaning. So the 50 states are actually states united within a single confederated state. Sorry if that’s confusing, but it wasn’t confusing for the founders when they did it.

So there was no intention of ever dividing again, once uniting. However, we know that marriage contracts, which are also intended to be permanent, do sometimes end. As with other contracts, they can end when one of the parties breaks the contract, meaning they refuse to abide by the agreements in the contract.

The agreements we abide by are contained in our US Constitution. It is a particular form of government. While there are democratic elements in it (voting by the people is involved), it is not a democracy, which would mean tyranny by the majority, regardless of laws, ethics, or agreements. It is a republic, which means there are representatives sent to represent the people, instead of having the people vote directly on each and every issue.

But it is also a particular kind of republic. The representatives can’t go do whatever they deem best on any given day; they must adhere to the limitations of the contract—the Constitution. What we have is a constitutional republic. That is what Texas—and each of the other states—signed on to join.

I am very much in favor of keeping connections that I value. But you can’t do that on one side only. There’s something about loyalty you have to get right. It’s a two-way thing. Being loyal to someone who is not loyal to you doesn’t maintain ties. You have to know what principles you’re acting on and be loyal to those principles—which will include loyalty to those people who are loyal along with you.

Loyalty to a person, or even a group of people, is the wrong idea. Yes, you want to be loyal to the person you’re married to and the people in your family. That means you seek the best for them. It doesn’t mean you follow them down a wrong path. You don’t hide a child from the law when they have done a heinous crime, for example. You don’t support an unfaithful and unrepentant spouse in mockery of your marriage contract.

So, how does this relate to Texas and the United States? If and when there comes a time when we can no longer say that the United States of America is a constitutional republic, then the contract is broken. This is not something to take lightly. As it says in our Declaration of Independence,

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient Causes; and accordingly all Experience hath shewn, that Mankind are more disposed to suffer, while Evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the Forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long Train of Abuses and Usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object, evinces a Design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their Right, it is their Duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future Security.

That comes just before the list of abuses in the Declaration, many of which are grievous, but many we will recognize today as much milder than what we’ve been suffering under a federal government that is usurping ever greater power.

To name just a few relatively new ones:

·       Government refuses to hear the evidence of voter fraud that has affected the state of Texas (and all the other states), dismissed the case as if it were none of our business how much other states use illegalities to affect the outcome of their elections.

·       Government has refused to protect our border—the longest length of which affects the state of Texas. Texas has long had to spend from its own treasury to do the border protection work that the federal government refuses to do. And then, when illegal aliens are apprehended and turned over to the federal government, the federal government sets them free among legal Texans, and requires Texans to pay for their food, housing, and education—and to suffer their crimes.

·       Government has trodden on our natural God-given rights of religion, speech, and assembly; has collected information to be used against us without warrant; and is attempting to disarm us so that we have no self-protection.

·       Government has attempted to control what is taught in schools, and to limit as much as possible the choice of parents to use non-public forms of education. Particularly, government has tried to institute a false history about our country and its founding, meanwhile indoctrinating our young people with harmful sexual deviancy.

·       Government has attempted to label as “terrorists” anyone who doesn’t go along with its usurpations. There is clearly a political double standard, and justice is no longer blind.

·       Government is currently in the process of arranging circumstances so that dissent will be stifled, and opposing views will never again have an opportunity to gain power by the normal means of election of legislators and executives, or appointments to courts who will abide by the written law. This includes threats (studies underway already) to pack the court, and to add states designed to give more representation to the current regime.

·       Government threatens to de-platform any dissenting voices, and threatens to “unite” by “cleansing” dissenting ideas from public discourse, using political prosecution, incarceration, and “deprogramming,” or brainwashing, and recruiting large tech companies to discriminate based on ideas or opinions, even affecting the ability to buy, sell, and making a living.

The list could go on almost endlessly. But that’s enough for a demonstration that we need to have the discussion.

Rep. Kyle Biedermann
from his Texas Legislature page

In Texas our legislature meets every other year for about five months of regular session, plus sometimes a limited special session (this year that will happen to address redistricting once the census data is available). The session just got underway a week ago. One of the recently filed bills is HB 1359, filed January 26, 2021, by Rep. Kyle Biedermann, of District 73, around Fredericksburg. It asks for the following question to be placed before the people on the November 2, 2021, ballot:

Should the legislature of the State of Texas submit a plan for leaving the United States of America and establishing an independent republic?

I’ve thought about this idea for a while. Actually, practically every Texan has, because we’re unique in our awareness of our sovereignty. Under Obama, I wondered if we needed something that would trigger such a question to be put before the people for vote. I thought it would be a longer process: put it in the party platform, propose bills to the legislature through multiple sessions, eventually pass something that would only come before the people once some particular egregious federal government actions were taken. And, who knows; it may still take forever.

But things have seemed compressed lately. We did indeed get a plank this past year in the platform:

65.          State Sovereignty: Pursuant to Article 1, Section 1, of the Texas Constitution, the federal government has impaired our right of local self-government. Therefore, federally mandated legislation that infringes upon the 10th Amendment rights of Texas should be ignored, opposed, refused, and nullified. Texas retains the right to secede from the United States should a future president and congress change our political system from a constitutional republic to any other system.

My records show the concept was introduced in the Constitutional Issues subcommittee in 2018 as well, but it didn’t make it into the final platform. That was two years into a Trump presidency when it didn’t seem urgent. Now, suddenly, it does.

I don’t find explicit wording in the Texas Constitution allowing for secession, nor any disallowing for it. Nor do limits on the states in the US Constitution specifically say states cannot secede. But it is understood generally that we are “indivisible”—that is, we can’t divide ourselves off. And there was a Civil War fought to keep states from seceding (other issues, such as slavery were involved, of course). Texas was one of those seceding states in the 1860s, brought back in by war.

No one currently talking about Texit wants war. We want freedom. We want to belong to a country abiding by the Constitution of the United States, which we still view as law and feel loyalty to.

So, we’re at the stage of marriage counseling. If the party that has strayed from the terms of the marriage contract refuses to repent or even move toward accommodation—and in fact continues to abuse the party that has held to the contract—then there may be a need to separate.

When Glenn Beck mentioned this recently, he stated plainly that he doesn’t think we should secede (he lives in Texas); he thinks those who don’t want the Constitution should leave.

I agree. I love our Constitution. But, just as an abusive and unfaithful husband shouldn’t have the power to keep his wife in a contract he has broken, nor beat her back into submission, the US federal government shouldn’t have the power to force Texas to stay where the government isn’t the Constitution we signed up for, but is instead a totalitarian regime attempting to wipe out our freedoms, our prosperity, and our civilization.

If there must be a separation, can we do it by retaining the Constitution—along with any other states that want to retain the Constitution—and allow the remainder, who prefer a socialist form of government, to go their separate ways?

If we’re in that marriage counseling stage, we need to be able to talk as if such a separation is on the table, for leverage to encourage repentance of the contract-breaking party. As our founders did with Great Britain, we need to know we have tried every means to work through the differences and have our grievances redressed.

The White House, viewed from the Washington Monument, September 2015

 

DC Statehood

I’m not giving myself much space for this second large issue. But it’s pertinent as well. Washington, DC, is a particular kind of entity, intentionally. It was set up as the seat of federal government, outside of all existing states, so that no state would be either favored or burdened with the logistics of maintaining the federal government.

It isn’t unique. The Vatican, for example, is a city entity of its own, located within the city of Rome, but not part of it.

The District of Columbia was limited in size, ten square miles, set up as mainly official spaces: the capitol building, the White House, monuments, museums, and government office buildings. It was not intended to be a city where people lived—except as a second home while performing their government duties. Even services, such as restaurants, could employ people in the city who lived without.

I remember a discussion, early 1990s, on radio with host Barry Farber, who in his youth had worked in the capital. But he lived outside the city, I think in Virginia, so that he could retain his right to vote. I hadn’t taken notice of that distinction until then. But to those living and working there, it was a two-century understanding by then: if you want to have the right to vote, you have to maintain a residence in a state.

Over the years, DC has been expanded. Three rather large areas were annexed in the 1880s. It is now a large city, including work, industries, and services well beyond the maintenance of the federal government. It is so big that living outside the city while working inside the city isn’t possible for all. That space that got annexed is where workers live. That’s why it was a bad idea to annex the larger area.

If you look at the reasons for setting up a capital outside of any state, then you can see why it is unthinkable to grant statehood to the federal capital of the United States. In Federalist 43, James Madison wrote,

The indispensable necessity of complete authority at the seat of government, carries its own evidence with it.… Without it, not only the public authority might be insulted and its proceedings interrupted with impunity; but a dependence of the members of the general government on the State comprehending the seat of the government, for protection in the exercise of their duty, might bring on the national councils an imputation of awe or influence, equally dishonorable to the government and dissatisfactory to the other members of the Confederacy.

His vocabulary is challenging for people raised on memes and tweets, so let’s just say that people living in the capital’s state would have unfair access and influence on the legislators and government officials, and those officials would feel beholden to that state above other states, because the work they must do is accommodated there.

In 1961, the residents of DC were given an electoral college vote. But, without becoming a state, they don’t have their own US representative. That single delegate gives them limited voting power, similar to Puerto Rico or American Samoa. Personally, I believe it is wrong to give legislative representation to DC. Who are they representing? Those involved in their major industry—the federal government. The city itself has a mayor and a governing board, elected by the residents, overseen by the federal government. The people have input into that representation.

Again, people who choose to live there were supposed to know they were making a decision that disallowed them from voting. And it would be better if the residential and nongovernmental businesses had not been annexed into the US capital city.

One thing about that city: they love big government. It is their bread-and-butter industry. So much so that they don’t seem to mind that it has brought them crime and poor schools—from which they are not allowed to escape.

It is their taste for big government that makes the issue pertinent right now, under a Biden administration. He promised (threatened) to pack the courts: by adding as many justices as he wanted, in order to guarantee a majority who share his opinions; and by adding states such as DC, Puerto Rico, and maybe Guam, if he could guarantee two Democrat senators and as many congressmen for each. The purpose is to guarantee perpetual power to his party, nothing more. Any talk of “fairness” is just rhetoric.

If the concern is actually about getting representation to the residents of DC, the rational solution would be to split the city and return the annexed parts to their original states, limiting DC to its original 10 square miles, which were never intended for permanent residents.

 

Both of these discussions are in early stages. But they wouldn’t be discussed at all if the federal government were not usurping authority. Let’s have the discussion while heads are still relatively cool. Again, if we’re at the marriage counseling stage, you have to be able to speak freely. If you shut down discussion, then you’re not only breaking the contract, you’re making sure it stays broken.

 

Extra Reading

·       Texas Constitution  

·       HB 1359 bill text, authored by Rep. Kyle Biederman 

·       “Here's Why Washington D.C. Isn't a State” by Tessa Berenson for TIME, April 15, 2016. 

·       TEXAS SECEDE! FAQ 

·       “Parting Company” by Walter E. Williams, Nov. 28, 2012. 

Indivisibility

The word “secession” has been tossed about a bit since the election, maybe more here in Texas than in some places. It’s not something to toy with, and I don’t intend to do that. But I hope to add some clarity as to why it shouldn’t be casually considered.

There’s a nice little video spelling out whether Texas can secede; it’s worth viewing for some context.

 

 

With that background, I just want to add this analogy. States join the union of the United States with the intention of permanence—indivisibility—the way most people throughout history have entered marriage. “What God has joined together, let no man put asunder.”

Divorce is not supposed to happen, but it does. Historically, just cause has been reserved for the big A words: adultery, abandonment, addiction, abuse. Irritation, anger, disappointment, disagreement, and other failures are a difficult part of life, but not just cause for breaking a marriage covenant, if the marriage covenant itself is to continue to have meaning for society.

So, by comparison, a state in the union is meant to be a permanent part of the United States. That covenant should not be broken without just cause. Again, irritation, anger, disappointment, disagreement, and other failures are not just cause. However, there is this contract, the Constitution, that is essentially the marriage document between states and the federal government. If the Constitution is violated—and I think this must be in a clear, incontrovertible, unrepentant violation—such that the just cause for separation listed in the Declaration of Independence become true again, then the contract is by the union, and the state has the moral right to separate.

A marriage that expects one party to remain bound when the other feels free to violate repeatedly various parts of the covenant is nothing more than slavery. A Constitution that binds states to a union that violates many or most of the guarantees of freedom agreed to in the contract is nothing more than slavery. No state has made such an agreement. Our Constitution, unlike those of other countries where a constitution is viewed as merely some nice suggested wording about governing, is the supreme law of the land. Honoring the contract protects us all.

While the contract has been violated, and repeatedly, I don’t know that we are beyond all the other stages of correction—the marriage counseling parts. If we, in the various states, stand up against unjust laws, refuse to allow imposition of actions that break the contract—then we might find that the bully government backs down. There might be a renewed respect from the federal government toward the individual sovereign states. Until those steps (what we might call nullification in some cases) are taken, then we don’t know that dissolution is the only recourse.

Could there come a time when, as the Declaration of Independence says, “it becomes necessary for one People to dissolve the Political Bands which have connected them with another”? Yes. Some may argue we are there already. I say first, let’s as states stand up for ourselves and refuse to tolerate abuses of the Constitutional contract. Because, in the way divorce damages the family, divisibility would damage the union. And, without a divorce court to settle the division, that would be settled by whoever is the stronger force in war. In other words, if we’re not yet willing to fight to the death for our independence from the union, it’s not time to talk secession.