Mass. gave the U.S. its Constitution. Why it matters more than ever
If you were up early and found yourself in Lexington over the weekend, you might have mistakenly thought you'd fallen into a tear in the space-time continuum, what with all the folks in Revolutionary War cosplay, and all.
The reenactment of the battle that sparked America's fight for independence is an annual occurrence on Lexington's Battle Green. And this year, with the nation's 250th birthday looming, it comes freighted with some additional meaning.
And with this Monday being Patriots' Day here in the Bay State (and Marathon Monday!), it seemed like a good idea to review another of Massachusetts' key contributions to the founding of the Republic.
Namely, that the Bay State's Constitution, drafted in 1780 by Quincy's own John Adams, was the template for the U.S. Constitution, written seven years later, by James Madison.
For that refresher, MassLive turned to Jerold Duquette, a Central Connecticut State University professor, who tracks Massachusetts politics. Here are 3 things to know about the Bay State's founding document, and why we wouldn't be the country we are now without it.
Duquette, the co-editor of 'The Politics of Massachusetts Exceptionalism,' took a few minutes to share his thoughts last week. This conversation has been lightly edited for content and clarity.
Q: It's Patriots' Day in Massachusetts. What's the one big thing we need to know about the Massachusetts Constitution?
Duqette: 'Given what we're now experiencing in [the] state and nation ... the most significant thing about the Massachusetts Constitution that should be heralded from the top of Beacon Hill is the very clear existence of legislative supremacy, both … in theory and in practice .... legislative supremacy was invented in Massachusetts. The framers of the Massachusetts Constitution had spent a century-and-a-half as legislators beating the s**t out of royal governors.'
Q: Why does that matter?
A: 'In Washington today, we're seeing the [poison] fruits of legislative supremacy, [it] having been dashed incrementally. Basically, for our last 100 years, Congress has gradually, sometimes not so gradually, surrendered power to the executive. And now we have an executive running all over the Constitution and a [legislative branch] doing nothing.'
Q: If you're looking for through-lines between the Massachusetts and U.S. constitutions, what are the most obvious drop-and-drags?
A: 'The most important things, I would contend, are these two concepts, which are legislative supremacy and separation of powers."
'Now, not a lot of people want to talk about legislative supremacy ... it's kind of tricky, right? If you're talking about legislative supremacy, I'm talking about a concept of principle. And I'm certainly talking about how it has worked out in Massachusetts.'
'But what you hear lawyers and even constitutional law professors sometimes say is that the Constitution of Massachusetts, as well as the Constitution of the United States, envisioned separation of powers [and] coequal branches.'
'However, they're always careful to say that only one of the branches is really completely independent and is preeminent — or the first among equals — and that is the legislature. I call that legislative supremacy."
'Lots of American historians and constitutional experts in the 20th century did as well, but it's clearly not the case in the United States. Right? The American Constitution has, in fact, no longer has legislative supremacy, because the Congress and the courts have essentially ceded authority to the president.'
Q: What do you think the framers would make of this creep of the unitary executive, which has been a bipartisan phenomenon?
A: 'They would be terrified ... There were two ... big fears. Well, maybe it's the same fear, but it's two sides of the coin.
'They were very much afraid of the average person. In a sense, they were afraid of any kind of direct democracy. But they were also afraid of the kind of person who would be able to exploit the opinions of those masses, and that would be the demagogue. They were afraid of demagogic leaders being able to inflame the passion. So, mob rule is a fear of the people. But it's also a fear of the people who would strike fear in the people.'
'You don't really have to be a scholar to recognize that we have a demagogic president who is taking full advantage of the power of public opinion .... Executives are very, very comfortable now claiming an electoral mandate. That's not really something the framers would ever have wanted. They would not have wanted any president ... to be claiming that they are the people's president.'
Q: What should people be reflecting on today? What will you be reflecting on during Patriots Day?
A: 'I think I'll be reflecting on the dangers of the unitary executive theory, and how we're seeing it at the national level. You know that danger is imminent.'
As if we needed further confirmation that driving in Massachusetts is, indeed, a bloodsport, this new data from the folks at Insurify.com should do the trick.
First, the good news: Car accident rates declined in every state except Vermont and New York from 2023 to 2024. Those states had a 2% and 10% increase, respectively, according to the industry website's analysis.
But before Bay State drivers stop leaning on their horns long enough to take a bow, here's some sobering perspective: Massachusetts had the highest crash rate (6.07%) of all 50 states, according to that same analysis.
Insurify analysts calculated the accident rate based on the number of accidents and the total number of drivers in each state.
If it's any consolation, nearly all of our fellow New England drivers are also menaces on the road.
New Hampshire had the second-highest crash rate at 5.81%, followed by Rhode Island, which finished third at 5.63%. Maine finished fourth at 5.38%.
And while Bay Staters like to mock Connecticut, the Nutmeg State finished 29th, at 4.22%, according to the Insurify analysis.
'People are struggling, and too many of the folks in charge are out of touch or out of reach. I've seen what it's like when rent eats half your paycheck. When schools go underfunded year after year. When entire neighborhoods feel like they're being pushed out. And I know I'm not alone — that's the Boston too many of us are living in."
The call is coming from inside City Hall. Kerry Augustin, 26, a receptionist for Boston's Age Strong Commission, jumped into the crowded field of candidates who are looking to challenge incumbent Mayor Michelle Wu.
US-Canada relations tested as border library faces new restrictions | John L. Micek
Layoffs begin amid 'budget crisis' at Harvard's Chan School of Public Health
Western New England Law prof fighting Trump's ban on trans people from military
Kerry Augustin, City Hall employee, joins Boston mayoral race
Mass. House Speaker Mariano resists calls for indicted Cape Cod rep. to resign
Trump admin cancels $90 million in disaster prevention aid for 18 Mass. communities
Why Harvard was willing to risk $9B to fight Trump
Springfield Democrats huddle on May 10 at Springfield Central High School (and virtually) to pick their slate of delegates to this year's Democratic State Convention.
Democrats from the City of Firsts have home-field advantage for the party conclave, which is being held at the MassMutual Center in downtown Springfield. on Sept 13.
The May 10 event gets rolling at 10:30 a.m., with registration closing at 10:45 a.m. The caucus will also feature speeches by local elected officials and party leaders.
Japanese Breakfast, the nom de rock for singer-songwriter Michelle Zauner, plays the MGM Music Hall in Boston on May 7 (Tickets and more info here). The band has an outstanding new record out, 'For Melancholy Brunettes (& sad women),' that builds on an already impressive discography. From that LP, here's 'Orlando in Love.'
From name and likeness rights to the transfer window, the big-money business of college football has seen some equally big changes over the last few years.
Another biggie: The rise of the college football general manager. Sam Khan Jr., writing for The Athletic, explains why you need a GM if you intend to be a serious player. One caveat though: This change has been underway for years.
Here's the germane part:
Across college football, employing a general manager has become table stakes for programs that are serious about talent acquisition.
A GM's role can vary, but in most cases, that person oversees all aspects of roster construction: high school recruiting, the transfer portal, name, image and likeness compensation and — once the House v. NCAA settlement is approved — a revenue-sharing payroll.rule
Some programs have prioritized hires with NFL experience to help navigate an offseason that looks more professionalized by the day, especially with contract negotiations and NFL-style holdouts playing out in increasingly public forums.
In 2025, the GM has become one of the most important athletic department hires a school can make. But college football GMs aren't an overnight invention. They're a movement nearly 20 years in the making, with the largest roots tracing to some of the sport's most storied programs.
Major rule changes accelerated general managers' evolution from back-office grunts to one of the most influential people in the building. And their profile is only rising.
One more caveat: The full story is subscription-only.
That's it for today. As always, tips, comments and questions can be sent to jmicek@masslive.com. Have a good week, friends.
US-Canada relations tested as border library faces new restrictions | John L. Micek
3 UMass poll numbers that could worry Republicans. And 1 for Democrats | John L. Micek
Mass. Gov. Healey has a GOP challenger. 3 big questions we're asking | Bay State Briefing
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
8 minutes ago
Democrats blast GOP-proposed Texas congressional maps in redistricting showdown
Democratic Rep. Jasmine Crockett said Friday that GOP-proposed congressional maps in Texas would draw her out of the district where she lives, part of a redistricting effort Democrats say is aimed at at picking up five seats to keep Republican control of the U.S. House of Representatives. During public testimony at a hearing on the plan in the state capitol, Crockett said she had been asked to confirm her home address by the legislature, she said, ahead of the previous field hearings. "In addition to the fact that I know that this legislature did ask us as members of Congress to confirm our addresses, I don't know how many of us actually still reside in the districts that we represent. I do not currently reside in my district based upon the plan that has been drawn, which is another red flag," she said. She alleged that some other members had also been drawn out of their seats. More broadly, Crockett attacked the proposed maps as discriminatory and the map "does nothing but divide, distract and depress," she said. Democratic Rep. Lloyd Doggett, who currently represents Texas' 37th Congressional District but would be in the same district as fellow Democratic Rep. Greg Casar if the new maps go through, told the hearing that he is an "unusual opponent of this plan" because more than half of the people in the district he represents, which he said he's filed for reelection in, are still there. "This is not a Texas map. It is a Trump map. It was not requested by any Republican or any Democrat in Texas. It was imposed by President Trump, who has a stranglehold on Congress, and the only question here is whether he also has a stranglehold on this Texas legislature," Doggett said. Republican state Rep. Todd Hunter, who filed the bill containing the new maps and chaired the 2021 redistricting committee in the legislature, told the hearing that "political performance" was part of the considerations when drawing the maps. Hunter also said later that the "newly drawn districts now trend Republican in political performance. Doesn't guarantee electoral success. Does not guarantee; that's up to the candidates, but it does allow Republican candidates the opportunity to compete in these districts." Redistricting in both red and blue states has often been alleged to be partisan; the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 2019 that federal courts cannot police partisan gerrymandering. Outside of the hearing, protesters gathered in the capitol's rotunda to slam the maps, according to photos shared by state Rep. Gene Wu and former U.S. Rep. Colin Allred. Some Republicans have defended the proposed new maps and redistricting effort. Texas Republican Sen. John Cornyn, responding on Thursday to the proposed new congressional maps in his home state, said, "Texas has changed, like many other states, and there are a lot more Republican voters, and they're underrepresented in the current maps. And so this is a chance to align the population changes and the voting changes in Texas with those maps, so that everybody gets fair representation."
Washington Post
8 minutes ago
- Washington Post
Why Trump's tariffs are in trouble
It's impossible to look away from President Donald Trump's theatrical trade policy. Every day can bring a triumphant trade deal or a new tariff barrage. For markets and the news media, the minor detail of whether any of this is legal has faded into the background. Maybe not for much longer. On Thursday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit heard arguments on Trump's tariffs. The icy reception the administration received ought to have highlighted the policy's constitutional vulnerability. But that defect still isn't getting enough attention. Trump's claim to virtually unlimited tariffing power comes from the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act. The IEEPA is a sanctions and embargo law that doesn't even mention tariffs. No president invoked it to impose tariffs for 48 years after its passage, until Trump did so this year. The Constitution says Congress, not the president, has the power to 'lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises,' and 'regulate Commerce with foreign Nations.' The U.S. Court of International Trade ruled 3-0 in May that Trump had exceeded his powers under the IEEPA, prompting the president to lash out with unusual ferocity. But the Federal Circuit suspended that ruling to let appeals play out, leaving Trump's tariffs in effect, and the news media moved on. Thursday's argument suggests that the Federal Circuit's 'stay' decision wasn't a judgment on the merits. The 11-judge panel seemed skeptical that the IEEPA is a strong enough legal basis for the president to commandeer Congress's commercial and taxing powers. Congress has written intricate trade laws over the past century that detail under what circumstances, at what levels and for how long the president can impose tariffs. 'Why would the president ever rely on all of these trade statutes,' Judge Jimmie V. Reyna asked the Justice Department on Thursday, 'if he has, under IEEPA, this unbounded power?' The judge added, 'Your argument dislocates that entire U.S. trade-relief framework.' Put more bluntly: If Trump is right, what is the point of U.S. trade law? The lawful tax rate on any import is just whatever the president says it is on any given day. The Justice Department insisted that Trump's tariff power is not unlimited. But conveniently, it also insisted that the key limit — whether there is, in fact, a national emergency triggering the IEEPA — is not reviewable by the courts. The only real check on unilateral presidential tariffs would therefore be new legislation explicitly stripping the president of the powers he usurped. But the president is 'not likely to cabin his own authority by signing legislation,' Judge Timothy B. Dyk observed. Eight of the 11 judges on the Federal Circuit panel were appointed by Democrats, including the two quoted above, so its eventual ruling won't necessarily predict how the conservative-leaning Supreme Court will see the issue when the losing side appeals. But if the courts do eventually ratify the Trump administration's position, it wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that a key premise of the Constitution will have been inverted. Legal-process arguments are sometimes the province of academics and pedants. Not this one. As one amicus brief notes: The Constitution assigned fiscal powers to Congress rather than the president 'not as a formality, but as a structure of democratic accountability rooted in the issues that originally led to the creation of the United States.' The American colonies literally rebelled against Britain in part because it imposed tariffs without giving the colonists a say in Parliament. Congress can delegate power to the president, of course. But one theme of this Supreme Court's (conservative) jurisprudence in recent years is that when Congress delegates enormous powers, it must do so unambiguously. That 'major questions doctrine' is designed to force accountability. The Supreme Court's conservative majority has invoked it repeatedly against adventurous Democratic policies — voiding the Obama administration's Clean Power Plan as well as the Biden administration's orders barring evictions and forgiving student loans. Did Congress really delegate all its constitutional power over border taxes a half-century ago in the IEEPA when it said presidents can 'regulate … importation' during national emergencies? This delegation is at least as ambiguous as in past 'major questions' cases. Yet Trump is exploiting the law to make further-reaching changes to the U.S. economy than did the Democratic policies that failed the major-questions test at the Supreme Court. There appear to be three reasons so many smart people are nonetheless discounting the magnitude of the legal threat to Trump's tariffs. The first is the perception that the Supreme Court favors executive power, and it's true that Trump's executive-power claims have been on a winning streak at the high court in recent weeks. But there is a profound difference between presidential power over the executive branch — the so-called unitary executive theory — and presidential power to reach into the other branches. This court wants to protect core presidential powers, such as the power to remove subordinates, from interference. By the same token, it should want to carefully guard core congressional powers, such as the power to regulate commerce, from usurpation by the executive. The second reason to downplay the threat to tariffs is the expectation that the Supreme Court will shy away from intervening in 'foreign affairs.' Fair enough: The administration's claims that an adverse ruling would disrupt diplomatic negotiations will probably carry some weight. But though tariffs can be a tool of foreign affairs, they mechanically operate on U.S. companies within the borders of the United States, which must pay taxes on the products they import. President Harry S. Truman claimed foreign-affairs power to seize steel mills during the Korean War. The Supreme Court's 1952 ruling blocking that seizure is one of the court's most famous. Republicans might want to be careful about carving out a zone of excessive deference to presidents who claim 'foreign affairs' power to compel behavior by people and entities in the United States. Could a Democratic president impose Green New Deal policies and cite international climate diplomacy to win a pass from judges? What if the president claimed public health regulation was integral to national security and foreign affairs, since viruses cross borders? The third reason some expect Trump's tariffs to survive the Supreme Court is that the court's conservative majority either favors Trump as a matter of partisanship or is cowed by his rhetoric and the specter that he will defy judicial orders. It's certainly true that extralegal pressures affect the behavior of the Supreme Court, just as they affect any other institution. But consider that a ruling against Trump on tariffs would be extraordinarily difficult to defy. Courts might not be able to force Trump to return a wrongly deported immigrant, for example, or to withdraw the National Guard from a city. But if the Supreme Court invalidated a border tax, Customs and Border Protection could not continue to passively collect it from thousands of well-lawyered U.S. corporations. Many would simply refuse to pay. Moreover, if the Supreme Court is worried about its public standing, applying the major-questions doctrine against Republican as much as Democratic administrations might be the savvy long-term strategic move. Blessing Trump's tariff policy after blocking comparatively minor Democratic power grabs would strengthen perceptions that the Supreme Court's doctrines are applied asymmetrically, with unknown consequences the next time Democrats control the elected branches of government. The bottom line is that Trump's tariffs are on shaky legal ground. The administration is certainly preparing unilateral work-arounds in case of an adverse Supreme Court ruling. President Joe Biden tried other means of canceling student loans after the Supreme Court struck down his first attempt. But if Trump's trade deals are so great, why not insulate them from the courts by asking the GOP-controlled Congress to ratify them? The question answers itself: because Trump has no use for Congress. Which is precisely the legal and constitutional problem with his tariffs, and it isn't going away.
Bloomberg
8 minutes ago
- Bloomberg
Supreme Court to Consider Outlawing Race-Based Voting Districts
The US Supreme Court indicated it will consider outlawing the use of race in drawing voting maps, setting up a blockbuster showdown with implications for dozens of congressional districts with predominantly minority populations. Expanding a Louisiana case already on their docket, the justices said they will consider arguments that the 1965 Voting Rights Act no longer provides a legitimate basis for map-drawers to intentionally create majority-Black or majority-Hispanic districts.
