Good morning –

Popular culture pushes us to build monuments for ourselves, rating our value by the number of likes and retweets we get from our most recent hot-take. Everyone hopes “going viral” is the path to being remembered. I reflect this week on that delusion.

First, here is today's Texas Minute.

– Michael Quinn Sullivan 

Friday, June 18, 2021
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Citizen Activism Pays Off

• Constitutional carry has been a top priority for the Republican Party of Texas and gun owners across the Lone Star State for a long time. In fact, constitutional carry was the first “legislative priority” approved by the delegates to the Texas GOP’s convention a decade ago.
        

• As Brandon Waltens finds in a new autopsy report, the sustained push by citizen-activists is what led to constitutional carry making it across the finish line this year – despite heavy opposition from senators and law enforcement groups. 

      
• On Sept. 1 when the law takes effect, Texas will become the 21st state to implement constitutional carry.

Lobbying Against You

• Even with overwhelming bipartisan support for ending the practice of taxpayer-funded lobbying, lawmakers chose petty politics over good policy.
       
• That’s a pretty good summary of Jeramy Kitchen’s autopsy report on the issue. The lack of a statewide ban on taxpayer-funded lobbying was a blow to activists led to believe that legislative momentum was on their side.
       
• While the Texas Senate passed legislation banning the practice for cities and counties, the Texas House State Affairs Committee let it stall for a month. Then the language was replaced to turn it into a bill creating permission for local governments to fund lobbying activities.
     
• Ultimately, the flipped upside-down measure was placed on the agenda for consideration by the House on the last possible day… and was killed when the House sponsor – Beaumont Republican Chris Paddie – snidely postponed consideration until after the conclusion of the legislative session.
      
• Gov. Greg Abbott has hinted that at least two special sessions are on the horizon. One will be called to address congressional redistricting, and the other to deal with the death of two of his own legislative priorities: election integrity and bail reform. It is unclear if a ban on taxpayer-funded lobbying might be added to one of those calls.

All of the Autopsy Reports for the 87th Session of the Texas Legislature can be found in the tools section of our website.

Rivals Say Abbott Not Protecting Texans

• Gov. Abbott’s primary rivals are challenging him to protect Texans by prohibiting employers from mandating a COVID-19 shot. While the governor has not responded to inquiries about employer mandates, Robert Montoya did hear from GOP gubernatorial candidates Chad Prather and Don Huffines, as well as rumored candidate Lt. Col. Allen West.
   
• “I find it rather unconscionable that we have mandatory vaccinations in the Lone Star State, something we would expect from a tyrannical progressive socialist leftist state,” said West.

📺 Wall Building

• Brandon Waltens is back on The Headline later this morning, chatting with Jeramy Kitchen about the biggest stories in Texas – including the announcement that Texas will build its own border wall. Cary Cheshire from Texans for Fiscal Responsibility will stop in to talk about their newly released Fiscal Index. Catch the show live at 11 a.m., or the video archive/podcast immediately after.

Critical Protest

• Parents and educators will hold a protest on June 22 against the Fort Worth Independent School District’s plans to continue implementing Critical Race Theory into the curriculum. Tera Collum has the details. 
   
• Rally organizers are also asking citizens who oppose CRT being used in FWISD schools to send a letter to the school board.

Friday Reflection: A Lasting Impact

It doesn’t look like much today, but the Israeli archeological site Tel Sheva is kind of a big deal. It was at the center of much of the narrative in the Bible’s Book of Genesis.

Its name back then was Be’er Sheva. Most translations of the Bible render the name as “Beer-sheba.” It’s in the Negev desert in the south of Israel where Abraham and Sarah lived with Isaac, and where the great patriarch swore an oath of peace with his neighbor. As adults, both Isaac and his son Jacob found themselves at various times passing through or living in Beer-sheba.

Everyone knew Beer-sheba… until they didn’t. The city was likely destroyed when the Babylonians invaded Israel and took the Jews into captivity around 600 B.C. The city was all but erased from the map, but its name and impact lived on.

The place was so well known, in fact, its name was commonly used in describing borders and distances. An expansive area would often be described as spanning an area as if from “Dan to Beer-sheba.” Tel Dan, of course, is in the far north of Israel. 

When I think of Beer-sheba, I think about the trappings of modern success. It is easy to be consumed by our reputation, to be thought of as relevant. In this age of social media influencers, the culture pushes us to rate our value by the number of likes and retweets we get from our most recent hot-take. We hope that by “going viral” we will be remembered. It’s all an illusion.

Most multi-generation native Texans cannot name any governor from a century ago. Most Americans have a hard time remembering who was the vice president of the United States a decade ago. Fame and notoriety are fleeting.

Beer-sheba didn’t strive to be remembered, it was simply useful. It was the practical usefulness of the place that established its reputation, and secured it long after the city itself had vanished.

However exalted or self-important we may be, we all eventually become a footnote in the great story of history. The monuments to our greatest achievements will become dusty artifacts for future archeologists.

But yet, like Beer-sheba, our legacy can go on. 

The Greek statesman Pericles understood this when he wrote, “What you leave behind is not what is engraved in stone monuments, but what is woven into the lives of others.”

Let us not live for recognition, but for impact. Let us not seek fame, but lasting value. Let us not build up our names, but rather build into the lives of those around us.