You Don’t Mess With Texas, And You Sure Don’t Mess With Business Freedom
Author: Camilla Taylor, Executive Director, American Sustainable Business Council
Most people are shocked when they find out the Executive Director of the American Sustainable Business Council (ASBC), the C4 branch of American Sustainable Business Network (ASBN), lives in Texas. They assume I must live on one of the coasts, tucked into a booming metropolis or spread out in an off-the-grid cabin. While I have lived in both, I am a resident of Texas, just outside Houston.
This morning, while getting the kids off to school, I recounted to close neighbors I bumped into the news of our major court victory and what SB 13 meant for businesses in Texas and across the country. Their responses were all the same, regardless of political leanings. A smile and the rally cry of the State, “Don’t mess with Texas.”
If you know Texas, the people of Texas, and the culture here, the ruling is a little less surprising, and it drives home what we at ASBN knew all along. Yes, this case involved the unethical involvement of large oil and gas companies in politics and their disproportionate influence on legislation and politicians’ submission to those large checks. But that was not the heart of this case.
This case was about freedom and about the American private sector having the ability to function without unconstitutional meddling from the government. You do not mess with Texas. You do not mess with businesses that choose how they operate or investors who decide to invest in ways that minimize risk and deliver strong returns. That is the responsible and sustainable way to operate in the real world.
I find myself, especially these days, explaining and sometimes defending sustainability. At its core, sustainability comes down to two things:
- Risk mitigation, and
- opportunity.
It is transparent supply chains, resource-conscious allocation, and operations built for the long term. It is looking at returns in years and decades, not quarters. That is what sustainability is, and that is what ESG reporting was designed to support. It is discipline. It is foresight. It is good business.
The decision, the first of its kind, came as part of an order granting summary judgment in ASBC v. Hagar, a lawsuit filed in 2024 by the American Sustainable Business Council acting on behalf of members, including Etho Capital and Sphere. The case challenged SB 13 for violating our members’ free speech and association rights protected under the First and Fourteenth Amendments of the United States Constitution. ASBN was represented by Democracy Forward, Emery Celli Brinckerhoff Abady Ward and Maazel LLP, and Guerrero and Whittle PLLC..
So what does this mean?
It means there is no freedom without choice. No freedom without existing in the world as it is, with planetary boundaries and a diversity of people and ideas. Companies and investors who operate in the real world, rather than chasing short-term political wins or short-term profits, are exercising a freedom that is deeply protected by our Constitution. This ruling will have ripple effects across the country because you cannot punish long-term thinking.
Today is a good day for businesses in Texas.
Today is a good day for businesses across America.