West Virginia lawmakers are pushing a resolution inviting Virginia’s Second Amendment Sanctuary counties to become constituents of West Virginia.

The resolution–HCR 8–highlights 1863, the year Republicans broke with slave-owning Virginia Democrats and formed West Virginia.

The divide then was that the people of Western Virginia did not believe “the government at Richmond” had their best interests at heart and that such a divide exists again again today (over 118 local governments in Virginia have declared themselves Second Amendment Sanctuaries for this reason).

West Virginia Delegates use the resolution to pledge that the gun rights now under assault by Virginia Democrats will be protected for those counties that choose to become part of the state of West Virginia:

HCR 8 states:

Whereas, Article VI, Section 11 of The Constitution of the State of West Virginia explicitly permits additional territory to be admitted into, and become part of this state, with the consent of the Legislature and of a majority of the qualified voters of the state; and Whereas, In a spirit of conciliation, the Legislature of West Virginia hereby extends an invitation to our fellow Virginians who wish to do so, to join us in our noble experiment of 156 years of separation from the government at Richmond; and, we extend an invitation to any constituent county or city of the Commonwealth of Virginia to be admitted to the body politic of the State of West Virginia, under the conditions set forth in our state Constitution, specifically, with the consent of a majority of the voters of such county or city voting upon such proposition; and we hereby covenant that their many grievances shall be addressed, and, we further covenant with them that their firearms rights shall be protected to the fullest extent possible under our Federal and State Constitution.

The resolution is sponsored by numerous Delegates, listed as “Howell, Summers, Shott, Householder, C. Martin, Hott, Graves, Cadle, Barnhart, J. Jeffries, Maynard, Phillips, Foster, Hamrick, Steele, D. Jeffries, Wilson, Waxman, Bartlett, Paynter and Linville.”

It calls for a Special Session of state legislators to plan “a special election to provide for the approval of the admission, or, the rejection of such admission, of such county or independent city.”

The Associated Press reports Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam (D) will announce a gun ban on January 15, 2020, unilaterally banning the exercise of the Second Amendment on Virginia Capitol grounds.

AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com. Sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange.