Good morning,

Our Founding Fathers didn't so much "declare" independence as assert the long-held expectations of the American people. I'll explain what I mean below.

But first, this is the Texas Minute for Friday, June 30, 2023.

– Michael Quinn Sullivan 

PROGRAMMING NOTE:
The Texas Minute will return on Wednesday, July 5, 2023!

Precinct Chairs In Orange County Unite Around Censuring Phelan

• After Texas House Speaker Dade Phelan’s “apparent debilitating intoxication” on the House floor and other concerns, a supermajority of Orange County Republican Party precinct chairs say they are ready to censure him. Valerie Munoz has the full story.
    
• According to the Orange County precinct chairs, Phelan has violated numerous planks of the Texas GOP platform – including the appointment of Democrats to committee chairmanships.
       
• With 14 out of 20 precinct chairs in the largest voting county in Phelan’s district signing a letter in support of the censure—and three more who didn’t sign the letter but were reportedly willing to vote in support—the two-thirds majority needed would have been met, thereby resulting in a censure. 
       

• Although the censure motion was made and seconded during this week's meeting of the county party, Orange County Republican Chairman Leo LaBauve would not allow a vote to occur.

      
• Neither Speaker Phelan nor Chairman LaBauve responded to Texas Scorecard’s request for comment.

Race-Based Admissions Must Now End In Texas' Universities

• As has been widely reported, the U.S. Supreme Court issued two rulings yesterday that effectively end the use of race in college admissions. Sydnie Henry has the details.
    
• The SCOTUS ruling will require the ending of race-based admissions practices at the University of Texas and affect both Rice University as well as Southern Methodist University.
       
• Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who filed an amicus brief against race-based admission policies, celebrated the ruling on social media.
       
• “I’m pleased they have ruled that higher ed admission policies based on race are discriminatory and unlawful.” – Ken Paxton

Texas Power Grid Breaks Record

• While Texans face triple-digit temperatures, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas reported that the state’s power grid broke the all-time peak energy demand record. Katy Marshall details the story.
    
• Earlier this week, the peak demand reached 80,828 megawatts, breaking the previous record of 80,148 megawatts. That had been set on July 20, 2022.
      
• With no end to the heat wave in sight, ERCOT “anticipates there will be sufficient generation to meet customer demand this summer.”

School District Adopts Policies on Bathrooms and Pronouns

• Trustees in the Keller Independent School District formally adopted policies related to bathrooms and pronouns this week, closing the door on gender politics. Erin Anderson has the story.
    
• Going forward, all bathrooms and personal spaces – like locker rooms – will be available according to biological sex and not ideological preferences. Likewise, district employees will not promote or require the use of pronouns inconsistent with an individual’s biological sex.
       
• “Common sense and grassroots activists prevailed at last night’s Keller school board meeting,” said Fran Rhodes, a district resident and statewide president of the True Texas Project.

School District Police Officer Accused of Soliciting Sex with 13-Year-Old Students

• A police officer in Pflugerville Independent School District is accused of using Snapchat to solicit sex with 13-year-old middle school students.
    
• Estavan Alonzo “Steve” Soliz, 49, an officer with the Central Texas school district's police force, was fired in May and then arrested on June 15 on charges of online solicitation of a minor.
      

• Soliz allegedly used the Snapchat phone app to message three 8th-grade students at Kelly Lane Middle School.
       

• A lawyer representing Soliz claims the messages were “taken out of context” and denies the officer did anything wrong.

Hurd Wants to Focus on the... Northern Border

• With the crisis on the southern border continuing to rage on, Republican presidential candidate and former Texas congressman Will Hurd is focusing his attention to the north. Emily Medeiros has the story.
      
• No; this is not a joke, a parody, or satire.
    
• Campaigning in New Hampshire, Hurd posted to social media that the U.S. border with Canada isn't getting the attention it needs. "We need to do more to protect our northern states like New Hampshire against the dangers [from the Canadian border]."
      
• Based on numbers from the U.S. Customs and Border Protection, there have been just over 115,000 encounters with illegals on the northern border in fiscal year 2023. In comparison, the agency has reported more than 1.6 million encounters on the southern border.

📺 WATCH: 'RINO Hunting' on The Headline

• Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller joins Brandon Waltens on this week's edition of The Headline to talk about why he believes the Texas Legislature blew major conservative opportunities – and what he’s going to do to fight back. Plus, Anita Scott from Texas Home School Coalition gives an update on the fight for educational freedom in the Lone Star State.
        
• You can watch The Headline on the Apple TV or Roku apps, on an iOS or Android phone, or on the Texas Scorecard YouTube channel.

Friday Reflection:
On Being Independent

Despite the name, the document really was not so much a “declaration” of independence as it was a recognition of independence. Our Founding Fathers were merely expressing in the legal and moral language of the day what was the current reality in the world around them. The American people were no longer subjects of the king.

I’ve told this story before, so forgive the repetition, but it is important to understand what the Americans believed in the 1770s.

Levi Preston was a minuteman at the Battle of Concord, in 1775. Many years later, he was asked why he had fought the British. The interviewer clearly expected him to wax forth eloquently about oppressive British rule, to deride the stamp tax and the tea tax, and sprinkle in quotes from the writings of philosopher John Locke.

He said none of that. You can almost hear the exasperation. “Well, then,” asked the interviewer, “why did you fight?”

To this day, Preston’s answer takes my breath away. “Young man, what we meant in going for those redcoats was this: We always had governed ourselves, and we always meant to and they meant that we shouldn’t.”

The Americans did not see “independence” as a new thing. Being free was the status quo, and Preston was intent on maintaining the freedom into which he had been born.

Self-governance is what the Americans had had, it was what they expected, and it was what they were willing to kill and die to retain.

They understood, as expressed in the document drafted in June 1776 and then adopted in early July of that year, that their rights came not from a king, a parliament, or any other man, but from God Himself. They understood those rights to be inalienable.

It was the king who had first broken faith. It was the parliament that had attempted to circumvent the self-governing status of the Americans. And so, after repeatedly petitioning for correction, the American people said they had had enough.

This is our legacy. This is our heritage.

Reading today the “long train of abuses and usurpations” on which our forefathers based their political separation from England, I cannot help but think they would be disgusted by us, their progeny.

We have allowed, in their name and on the basis of their work, even worse things to occur than the king could have dreamt possible. The taxes are higher,  the abuses more traumatic, and the usurpations more severe. And yet, like Roman citizens from a millennia earlier, we tolerate it as long as we can be entertained and get freebies from the government.

Freebies... paid for with the liberty of ourselves and our posterity.

It is time for Americans to emerge from our entertainment-soaked stupor. It is time for us to declare yet again our independence from the would-be masters. We must rise up and reclaim our heritage of self-governance now.

Independence Day should not just be a celebration of history, but a commitment to the future. We must again make self-governance in this republic a current reality.

Now Available: 'Reflections on Life & Liberty'

• The book comes in three formats: hardcover, paperback, and digital download. For now, "Reflections on Life & Liberty" is only available at Amazon.

REMINDER: The Texas Minute will return on Wednesday, July 5, 2023!