Republic of Texas (group)

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This article concerns a latter day independence movement surrounding Texas. For the original and then-recognized independent republic, see Republic of Texas.

Republic of Texas logo used in some of their documents and Web sites

The Republic of Texas is an independence movement that claims that the annexation of Texas by the United States was illegal and that Texas remains an independent nation under occupation. They claimed to reinstate a provisional government on December 13, 1995. Although Texan pride remains high throughout the population to this day, this group has little apparent support among Texans for its cause. However, a poll conducted by Texas Monthly magazine in the early 1990s resulted in greater than 70% of respondents supporting secession from the United States. Activists within the movement claim over 40,000 active supporters, a number which seems dubious at best.

The movement for independence was started by the research of Richard Lance (Rick) McLaren. McLaren found that, in 1861, Texans voted four-to-one to leave the Union. According to McLaren's work, Texas allegedly met the qualifications, under international law, of a captive nation of war, since the end of the American Civil War in 1865. McLaren engaged in a protracted series of court and actual battles. The movement split into three factions in 1996, one led by McLaren, one by David Johnson and Jesse Enloe, and the third by Archie Lowe and Daniel Miller. In 1997, McLaren and his followers kidnapped Joe and Margaret Ann Rowe, and demanded the release of two movement members in exchange for the Rowes. McLaren's wife, Evelyn, convinced him to surrender peacefully after a week-long standoff with police and Texas Rangers. The McLarens and four other Republic of Texas members were sent to prison (though charged with several felonies, all have been dropped). This effectively destroyed the McLaren faction, and the Johnson-Enloe faction was discredited after two of its members, Jack Abbot Grebe Jr. and Johnie Wise, were convicted in 1998 of threatening to assassinate several government officials, including President Bill Clinton.

In 2003 what remained of the movement consolidated into one dominant group recognizing the current "interim" government (which replaced the "provisional" government), headed by President Daniel Miller. This interim government claims authority from the original proclamations of 1995 and has set up a "seat of government" in the town of Overton. Most of the original personalities of the movement have disappeared from public view. Government finances have come from donations and the sale of some items such as a "Republic of Texas Passport". A separate movement, called the "Texas Convention Pro-Continuation 1861" (TCPC) claims to be the official authority "recognized by the State of Texas and the United States Government for the contemporary effort to bring to power, by popular vote of the People of Texas, the government of The Republic of Texas."

The Republic of Texas headquarters in Overton, Texas burned down on August 31, 2005. One person was moderately injured.

The Republic of Texas movement maintains several websites including an official website of the interim government, an Internet radio station, and a newspaper published bimonthly.

President Miller and Laurence Savage published the Republic of Texas's manifesto Texan Arise in 2004. The book outlines the history of Texas, the history and philosophy of the Republic of Texas group, a road map to independence, and some spiritualistic views of Texas.

A second important book for the movement is The Brief by the Republic of Texas, published in 2003, a comprehensive case against the United States and State of Texas governments. The book is laid out like a court case, and cites approximately 250 exhibits.

In January of 2004, a man in jail in Aspen, Colorado claimed that the state of Colorado had no jurisdiction to extradite him to California on a probation warrant, on the grounds that he was a citizen of the Republic of Texas. He claimed that the sliver of land which contains Aspen was a part of the original Republic of Texas and, as such, he was not a citizen of the United States. His claim was rejected by the courts.