LUBBOCK, Texas -
The Texas Republican Convention is next week and secessionists will be making an effort to add a provision to leave the Union to the party platform.
"There's a lot of frustration out here in West Texas and I would argue all of Texas about the way the Federal Government is running about their healthcare, and so a lot of people think the Federal Government has over stepped their bounds on fiscal and social issues," said Carl Tepper, Lubbock County's Republican Party chairman.
The U.S. fought a Civil War over the rights of states to secede from the Union. Now there is a fight to decide whether Texas has the right to become a sovereign nation again.
Daniel Miller, the president of the Texas Nationalist Movement said it is time to have a discussion over who the best people are to lead Texas.
"We believe that the best people to govern Texas are Texans and what we have seen over the decade that we have, as an organization have been involved in this fight, is that more and more Texans are coming to that realization," Miller said. "So much so, that in this latest campaign, we have already had over 250,000 people sign the pledge to vote yes and that number grows by the hour."
Miller and the TNM have led the fight for the better part of a decade. This past fall the group failed in its efforts to have the issue added to the March GOP primary ballot.
Despite the failure, those who favor secession are targeting the Texas Republican Convention in May to add language to the party platform that would support independence.
"If all roads for getting and winning binding vote on Texas independence lead through the legislature, then you have to go at it through that angle of the party in which they support. What we want to do in adding this to the Republican platform is essentially codify, put in writing what the majority of Republicans, the sentiments that they already express."
According to the TNM, more than half of the state's Republicans support an independent Texas.
Tepper said the moves makes sense and could even have a chance at the convention.
"I'd say probably about a 40 percent chance of the convention advocating for a platform change on a platform addition of a Texas sovereignty rule or law, some kind of language advocating that way," Tepper said. "It's non binding. It's what the Republican party thinks. It's not a legislative process, that would come from the Texas legislature."
Even with the possibility of it becoming part of the platform, Fox 34 legal analyst, Curtis Parrish said the odds of secession are minimal, due to the legality of it all.
"The Supreme Court case, Texas v. White in 1869 really laid out two ways in order for a state to secede; either by revolution, which is like the Civil War or by consent of the states," Parrish said. "If Congress, if the majority of the members of Congress of the states get together and say, we don't want this state to be in the Union anymore, then the Union can be dissolved that way to the state and it will become an independent nation or secede."
Tepper said is is a fun conversation to have regardless.
"It seems to be talk at the grocery store, coffee bar, and it's fun to talk about," Tepper said. "It's fun to remember our heritage of an independent nation but I think we are better off as one of the 50 states."
