The Republican National Convention is less than three weeks away and some GOP strategists say a festering dispute within the party could upstage the entire schedule of events in Tampa. Supporters of Texas Congressman Ron Paul continue to spar with Republicans loyal to Mitt Romney, the presumptive presidential nominee, over whether the former Massachusetts governor will allow Paul to speak at the convention. The seating of Maine delegates to the convention who are also Paul supporters is playing an increasingly larger role in how the dispute might end.

Bowdoin College Political Science Professor Christian Potholm has seen his share of Maine Republican Party squabbles, and he worries that the ongoing feud between supporters of Texas Congressman Ron Paul and Mitt Romney could hurt chances for a GOP presidential victory in November.

"I think it has the potential to be quite explosive," Potholm says. "I don't think the Ron Paul people are particularly interested in whether Obama is defeated or not. I think that's long passed as their number one objective."

Potholm, a Republican himself, says the failure by Maine State GOP Chair Charlie Webster to broker a compromise between delegates supporting Ron Paul, and party establishment leaders supporting Romney, does not bode well. Last month, longtime Maine Republican Party fixtures Peter Cianchette and Jan Staples challenged the right of 20 of the state's 21 elected delegates to be seated at the national convention in Florida.

They claim that the 20 representatives, all of whom support Paul, were elected illegally at the state convention in May. Webster says he tried last week to find a way out of the dispute, offering the Paul delegates the prospect of having the challenge dropped if they agreed to support Romney, in the event that Paul's name was not placed into nomination at the convention.

The Paul delegates turned him down cold, saying they weren't going to be part of any backroom deals and were elected to represent all Maine Republicans as unbound delegates.

"I just felt that if we offered a compromise and showed that in good faith we were trying to work together that maybe I could have gotten the RNC to request Jan and Peter to remove their challenge," Webster says.

The stakes are high for both sides. Paul's supporters need five states in which their candidate has received a plurality of delegates in order to place his name in nomination and earn a chance to address the national convention and influence the party platform.

Paul appears to already have seven states where he claims a plurality. Entrenched Romney supporters say it's their man's night and he shouldn't have to share the stage with Paul. Other Republicans have sought to find a compromise to put Paul at the convention podium. But Professor Potholm says even that option carries a certain degree of political peril.

"Why would you want him on the podium during your convention?" Potholm says. "If you're Romney you certainly would say, my goodness, this fellow has caused me a lot of trouble."

But efforts to diffuse the skirmish may already be underway.

"There are signs that Ron Paul himself is seeking a peaceful hand-off of leadership of his movement to his son, Rand," says William March, the senior political writer for the Tampa Tribune, who has been keeping a close eye on how convention plans are developing.

March says Paul may be trying to convince his supporters to let his son, Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, speak on his behalf at the convention -- despite the fact that the younger Paul is a Romney supporter. March also says Ron Paul is being very selective about appearing at certain Tampa events sponsored by his supporters before, during and after the convention.

"Ron Paul wants to control the tone of any event that he's involved in during the convention to make sure it's positive and not confrontational or hostile to the Republican party," March says. "Meanwhile the Republican Party has announced that Rand Paul will get a speaking slot at the convention. This suggests to me that what Ron Paul himself wants is kind of a peaceful handoff, but his supporters may not go along with it."

"This is the first time I've even heard speculation of something like that," says Eric Brakey, a Maine national delegate to the convention, and the former state director for the Ron Paul Campaign.

Brakey says the Paul ideology is greater than any single political figure. What's at stake in the Paul Movement, he says, is the restoration of the American republic and a freer society.