Texas Front-Runner...Calls on Governor to Mobilize National Guard to Prevent BLM Takeover

Restoring Liberty ^ | 4-15-2014 | Sid Miller Campaign

[smoothsailing]

April 15, 2014

Texas Front-Runner for Statewide Office Calls on Governor to Mobilize National Guard to Prevent BLM Takeover

Sid Miller Campaign

Sid Miller, the former Chair of the Texas House Homeland Security & Public Safety and Agriculture and Livestock Committees, and now the frontrunner in the Republican race for Texas Agriculture Commissioner, said today that the Bureau of Land Management’s decision to halt their forced removal of Cliven Bundy’s cattle in Nevada was only a temporary delay in the federal agencies attempt to violate the private property and water rights of Americana and warned Texans to remain vigilant against future BLM abuses.

Miller went further, calling on Texas Governor Rick Perry to mobilize the Texas State Guard, if necessary, in order to prevent the Federal Bureau of Land Management (BLM) from seizing 90,000 acres of land along a 116 mile stretch of the Red River.

Miller said that televised images of armed federal agents attempting a forced cattle round-up on a rural Nevada range have alarmed farmers, ranchers, and landowners, as well ordinary citizens across the Southwest. Miller says the actions of the BLM are unlawful and have ignited a new range war—this one between law-abiding citizens and their own federal government.

In Nevada, the roundup started last week, after the BLM and National Park Service shut down an area half the size of Delaware to let cowhands using helicopters and vehicles gather about 900 cattle that officials say were trespassing. Cliven Bundy, 67, and his large family cast their resistance to the roundup as a constitutional stand. He said he didn’t recognize federal authority over state land.

Although the BLM announced yesterday that they were backing down from what became a stand-off between Bundy and his supporters and heavily armed BLM agents, the dispute has widened into a debate about states’ rights and federal land-use policy. The dispute that triggered the roundup dates to 1993, when the BLM cited concern for the federally protected tortoise. The agency later revoked Bundy’s grazing rights. Bundy claims ancestral rights to graze his cattle on lands his family settled in the 19th century.

Miller says that BLM agents used excessive and unlawful force to exert their will and unnecessarily inflamed passions, putting lives as well as private property and state rights at risk. Miller said that especially disturbing was the BLM efforts to restrict supporters of Bundy to so-called “free speech zones.”

“Barack Obama may not understand the concept, but our founding fathers understood that the entire United States of America is a constitutionally protected “free speech zone,” Miller said.

In Texas, Miller says the BLM is attempting a repeat of an action taken over 30 years ago along the Red River when Tommy Henderson lost a federal lawsuit. The Bureau of Land Management took 140 acres of his property and didn’t pay him one cent.

Now, Miller says that BLM is attempting to use Henderson’s case as a precedent to seize land along a 116-mile stretch of the Red River. “They’re wanting to take the boundaries that the courts placed here and extend those east and west to the forks of the river north of Vernon and east to the 98th Meridian which is about 20 miles east of us,” Henderson explained. The BLM clams this land never belonged to Texas.

Sid Miller says that both he and the Texas landowners who have lived and cared for that land for hundreds of years beg to differ. BLM plans on taking the land anyway. Property owners will be forced to spend money on lawsuits to keep what is theirs. For many, that property has been in their family for generations and landowners not only have deeds to the property, but they have also paid property taxes for over one hundred years according to Miller. About 90,000 acres could be seized by BLM, disappearing across a new state line.

Miller said that if the BLM attempts to use the same kind of tactics in Texas that they have used in Nevada to unlawfully seize privately held land, that Texas Governor Rick Perry should mobilize the Texas State Guard to prevent them from doing so.

“What Barack Obama and his armed BLM agents did in Nevada is the worst violation of the tenth amendment and individual states rights I have seen in my lifetime,” said Miller.

“As Agriculture Commissioner, I will go to war with these out-of-control federal agents and bureaucrats who have no regard for the United States Constitution or state and individual rights,” Miller said.

“In the meantime, I would urge Rick Perry to be prepared to activate the Texas State Guard in order to defend the State of Texas and her citizens from an abusive federal government.

Miller said that the mission of the Texas State Guard (TXSG) is to provide mission-ready military forces to assist state and local authorities in times of state emergencies; to conduct homeland security and community service activities. They are not a part of the United States Armed Forces and are not subject to orders from the President.

“What happened in Nevada this week could very well happen in Texas next week and our citizens and their property have a right to protection. If not, we might as well as throw out our constitution and the concept of private property rights. We must always be vigilant against federal overreach. We must act now and we must act decisively,” Miller concluded.

[Texas Fossil]

“they have also found that congress has supremacy over state legislatures”

Not exactly. Congress is subject to the Constitution and that document clearly gives delegated powers to the Fed Gov and the remainder is reserved to the States and the People.

Now, have we the balls to hold the bastards in DC’s feet to the fire?

Guess we shall see. See you in DC on May 16th?

[Texas Fossil]

But the conflict between Texas and OK should not include the BLM Booger Eating Bureaucraps.

They can go pound sand, we will deal with OK cordially. TX & OK only have open conflict on sports fields.

We are same people. Made of the same stuff.

[Ditter]

That is what I remembered, no federal land in Texas but as sure as I said that someone would show up and correct me.LOL!

I was in Houston when the incident with the man in the wheel chair happened but sorry I must have missed it. How could I forget that? :)

[deport]

[pax_et_bonum]

Hi!

Looks like the big issue here is water control.

By the way, remember a couple of years ago when we had a drought and there were lots of fires in our state and federal help was refused to Texas?

[deport]

The feds owns some acreage in Texas but it has all been bought such as military bases,
etc or donated to the feds such as the Big Bend National Park.

The State of Texas delivered the deed to the Federal Government in September, 1943
and Big Bend National Park was officially established on June 12, 1944.

Texas never ceded any land to the Federal Gov’t when it became a state. All public land was retained by Texas.

[Marcella]

Thanks for the report on Texas land situation and the feds. I also thought of the Indian Reservations in Texas. This may be a dumb question, but do the Indians actually own the land in their reservations or do the feds own them? The nearest one to me is out of Livingston, Texas.

[greeneyes]

GOD BLESS THE TEXAS RANGERS AND GOD BLESS TEXAS

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Ditto that. Wish all the State Governments would push back against Fezilla as much as Texas!

[Ben Ficklin]

"We are the same people"

I see said the blind man. That's why DFW and Oklahoma have been court for 15 years over that OK water that DFW wants.

Way back then the OK GOP Guv made a deal with 3 tribes to sell the water to Texas, I think it was Kiamichi River water, but the OK lege didn't want to let Texas steal that water, so it all ended up in court.

And look at how things are connected. It was that water conflict with OK that set Boone Pickens in motion to develop those water rights up there in the panhandle as an alternative to the OK water.

[yefragetuwrabrumuy]

The Supreme Court has rejected nullification, finding that under Article III of the Constitution, the power to declare federal laws unconstitutional has been delegated to the federal courts and that states do not have the authority to nullify federal law.

In practice, this means that if a state legislature refuses to enforce a federal law it deems unconstitutional, it must sue “The United States” in federal court. Who, of course, invariably back the US against the states.

Federal courts have even gone so far as to insist that they have supremacy over state legislatures, usually to demand that they spend money for things they do not wish to spend money on, usually education. If the state refuses to comply, the judge will then appoint a “special master” who will take charge of the state treasury for the purpose of paying for what the legislature refuses to pay for.

All in all, very unconstitutional, the lot of it.

[deport]

The Indian Reservations are a mixed bag. The State orginally set aside land,
managed by the feds. Changes have occurred over time. A synopsis can be read here:

http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/bpi01

[Westbrook]

> so what is this 90,000 acres of private land takeover all about

Your guess is as good as mine, but I’m certain it involves wickedness in high places.

Not much different from the antics of the feaudal Sheriff of Nottingham.

[greeneyes]

Sadly, I think you may be right. The states are just about my only remaining hope, and a good portion of them are already hopeless.

[Kartographer]

GOD BLESS TEXAS!

[shotgun]

Gabby Johnson: The Sheriffs a N...

Crowd: What did he say?

Howard Johnson: He said the sheriff is near!

They stampeded the women and children, and raped the cattle!

[fwdude]

Sad or not, it is necessary. We MUST defend the state sovereignty that is CONSTITUTIONAL and intended by the Founders. Otherwise, we are a completely different country altogether than the FF’s envisioned.

[itsahoot]

They are not a part of the United States Armed Forces and are not subject to orders from the President.

They can be federalized in a heartbeat. Eisenhower used that trick in Little Rock.

Sheriff's posse's however are not subject to that trick and until Sheriffs figure out that they have great power this stuff will continue. Bundy is a least trying to wake them up, but is not very adept at presenting the case.

[itsahoot]

Every conservative state needs an active, independent, fully armed military - now more than ever before.

All they need is a few sheriffs with the b@lls to do their Constitutional duty. Someone needs to school Sheriffs all over the country as to the power that they legally have.

In every TV show or movie they always show local authorities ceding their authority to any alphabet agency that shows up.

[fwdude]

In every TV show or movie they always show local authorities ceding their authority to any alphabet agency that shows up.

That's because the Fed is backed by the potential overwhelming military power of the U.S. Armed Forces. We have to do our best to MATCH these forces, no strings attached.

Remember what happened during desegregation in the 60's? Whatever else you think of Governor Wallace's views on segregation, he was absolutely CORRECT that the federal government had NO Constitutional authority to do what they did. And what are the sheriffs of a local area going to do when they are bullied by more superiorily armed guardsmen?

[greeneyes]

Like I said, the states are the last hope. I agree they need to stand up. Too bad so many have already capitulated.