Secession Speakeasy #201: Reading TNM's New Mexico White Paper, and Arguing With the Law

Released October 15, 2026.

Professor Wall (Grant M. Dahl) and the Secession Minstrel look back at the Texas House’s September 30 hearing on whether New Mexico counties could join Texas. The hosts spend most of the episode on the white paper the Texas Nationalist Movement put on the record.

Wall reads the paper’s parity argument at length and agrees with it: a principle the House will entertain “for 156,000 residents of three New Mexico counties cannot be withheld from the people of Texas.” He also backs its use of Article 1, Section 2 of the Texas Constitution, which gives Texans the inalienable right to alter, reform or abolish their government.

“I’m not criticizing the TNM for how they approached this,” Wall says. His quarrel is with the law the paper describes. The paper notes that Texas, New Mexico and the U.S. Supreme Court all treat counties as subdivisions of their state. Wall argues that whoever calls counties mere subdivisions of a state has no answer when Washington says the same of the states. “Either the people rule or they don’t,” he says. Drawing on Ludwig von Mises, he holds that self-determination belongs to people, not governments, and that people settled those counties before any county government existed. The Minstrel adds that individuals hold sovereignty in their property and families, so stripping the word from anything “is problematic.”

Also in this episode

• Wall’s idea that if El Paso County were ever offered to New Mexico, the city and its suburbs should vote separately from the rural county
• Judge Thomas Cooley’s line that local government “is a matter of absolute right,” and the hosts’ case that corruption is easier to contain and root out locally
• The southeastern Colorado county that once asked to join Texas
• Idaho’s motto “Esto Perpetua” and governments that claim to last forever; the Minstrel’s view that “what the government expects from you is faith”

The Partisan’s earlier coverage: AG’s Office and Lawmakers Echo Texas Nationalist Movement on New Mexico Counties.

Secession Speakeasy is an independent program produced by Grant M. Dahl. The views expressed are those of the host and guests and do not necessarily reflect those of the Texian Partisan, Texas Nationalist Enterprises, or the Texas Nationalist Movement. Featuring an episode is not an endorsement.