Texas state rep. proposes bill to allow vote on secession from US

An effort to have Texans vote on whether they want to secede from the United States is gaining the support of at least one state lawmaker.

Rep. Kyle Biedermann of Fredricksburg said he plans to file a bill that calls for a referendum on the effort to leave the U.S.

"The federal government is out of control and does not represent the values of Texans," Biedermann said in a statement. "That is why I am committing to file legislation this session that will allow a referendum to give Texans a vote for the State of Texas to reassert its status as an independent nation."

The effort has been championed by the Texas Nationalist Movement, an organization headed by Daniel Miller, who has been promoting the idea of secession for 20 years.

FROM 2016: Nationalist group wants Texas to secede from the US

"Texans are tired of living under 180,000 pages of federal laws, rules, and regulations administered by 440 separate agencies and 2.5 million unelected bureaucrats," Miller said Wednesday. "If all federal laws, rules, and regulations were printed out and stacked, it would be taller than the San Jacinto Monument."

The proposed bill would join hundreds of others filed ahead of the 87th Texas Legislature, which is scheduled to convene in January.

Despite the idea, as a practical matter and matter of law, secession isn't an option in the nation.

Historical and legal precedents make it clear that Texas could not pull off a Texit - at least not legally.

"The legality of seceding is problematic," Eric McDaniel, associate professor of government at the University of Texas at Austin, said to the Texas Tribune in 2016. "The Civil War played a very big role in establishing the power of the federal government and cementing that the federal government has the final say in these issues."

SEE ALSO: What would it mean for the Lone Star State to secede?

Texas became an independent nation in 1836 and remained that way until its admission into the Union in 1845. Texas left the United States once before on Feb. 1, 1861, a sore point for then-Gov. Sam Houston, who refused to swear allegiance to the Confederate States of America. After the Civil War and Reconstruction of the 1860s, Texas was fully re-admitted into the Union in 1870.

Since then, there's been no shortage in another secession debate. Over the years, there have also been calls to divide Texas into five separate states.

As of Wednesday morning, Biedermann had not filed the bill, according to the Texas Legislature bill search website.