How would Texas protect minority rights generally?

The same way it protects the rights of every Texan: under the Texas Bill of Rights, which already guarantees equal protection to all, and as full and equal citizens of a Texas that belongs to everyone who lives here. Government by the consent of the governed means all of the governed. Independence does not weaken those protections. It puts Texas directly in charge of upholding them.

The protections are already written into Texas law

Texans do not depend on Washington for their fundamental freedoms. The Texas Constitution opens with a Bill of Rights that protects free speech, religion, due process, property, the right to keep and bear arms, and more, and it applies to every Texan. It also speaks directly to equality. Article 1, Section 3 guarantees that all who form the social compact have equal rights, and that no man or set of men is entitled to exclusive privileges except in consideration of public service. Article 1, Section 3a goes further, providing that equality under the law shall not be denied or abridged because of sex, race, color, creed, or national origin. Those guarantees are in force today, and they carry straight through independence.

Equal protection that answers to Texas directly

After independence, those protections are not second-guessed from a thousand miles away. They are upheld by Texas's own constitution and Texas's own courts, accountable to Texans. A right written into the Texas Bill of Rights and enforced by Texas judges is a right that belongs fully to the people of Texas, not one administered at a distance. Self-government means Texas answers to its own promises of equality, in front of its own people.

Consent of the governed means all the governed

The moral foundation of the movement is government by the consent of the governed, and that phrase has no asterisk. It means every Texan, of every background, of every faith, of every origin. A cause built on that principle cannot turn around and treat any group of Texans as less than full members of the nation. Independence is for all Texans or it is not what the movement says it is, and the movement has been unflinching that the politics of hatred have no place in it and contradict its founding premise.

Rights do not depend on being in the majority

A republic is built precisely so that rights do not rise and fall with the latest vote count. Separated powers, independent courts, and an entrenched Bill of Rights exist to protect the individual and the minority against any momentary majority. That is the design Texas already runs under, and it is the design an independent Texas keeps. No one's freedom of speech, worship, property, or equal standing under the law depends on belonging to the winning side of an election.

The bottom line

Minority rights in an independent Texas are protected by a Texas Bill of Rights that already guarantees equality to all, enforced by Texas courts answerable to Texans, on the foundation of government by the consent of every Texan. Self-government means governing for all of Texas.