The Battle of Gonzales is a reminder that tyrants seek to disarm their future victims. It is also a reminder that a free people must never surrender – neither their liberty nor their weapons. Not then, not now, not ever.

Here is today's Texas Minute.

– Michael Quinn Sullivan 

Wednesday, October 2, 2019
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• Robert Montoya in our Metroplex office has been doggedly pursuing information the Tarrant Regional Water District simply doesn’t want to provide about how taxpayer money is being spent on a marketing campaign. In a new post, Montoya describes the lengths to which TRWD and the two media companies they employ have gone in refusing to answer questions.
     
• While residents of Austin face an alarming public safety risk posed by the city council’s homeless “camping” ordinance, the city’s mayor has been busy on social media dodging blame for the disaster he helped create. Jacob Asmussen has the details.
       
• Under Austin Mayor Steve Adler’s direction, the city council adopted ordinances allowing vagrants to set up campsites in public rights-of-way; mostly in the underpasses along major traffic arteries but also in greenbelts and other areas. Incidents of violence and other health risks have been on the rise as a result, leading Austinites to speak out against the direction Adler and the very liberal city council are taking Austin.
     
• The State Republican Executive Committee wants Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to call a special session focused on pro-life issues. As Texas Right to Life notes, the action comes as a result of “the real frustration grassroots conservatives feel after witnessing the many disappointments” in the recent legislative session.

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Today in History 

In 1831, a cannon was given to the people of Gonzales for defense against hostile tribes of native Americans. As the Mexican government became more heavy-handed, the Texians knew they would have to defend their liberty from their own government as surely as they were defending their lives from marauders. The Mexican government knew they would, too. In late September, the military commander in Texas sent 100 dragoons to retrieve the cannon – Mexico intended to disarm the people of Gonzales. The people of Gonzales simply weren’t going to let that happen, though. Early in the morning of October 2, 1835, fighting broke out in what has since been named the Battle of Gonzales. As the day progressed, the outnumbered Mexican troops eventually retreated... without the cannon.