Thousands gather for daylong festivities celebrating Fourth of July in Boston
Angela Martin, 54, of Florida, was blown away by Boston's parade Friday morning.
'The Minutemen come out with the band and I'm like, 'What is this?'' she said. 'It was so meaningful.'
Dan Burns, Michele DeParasis, and Al Chin of the Billerica Colonial Minute Men enjoyed the confetti during the 249th Independence Day Celebration at Old State House.
Craig F. Walker/Globe Staff
Friday's festivities came on the heels of the milestone commemorations in April of the 250th anniversary of the Revolution's 'shots heard round the world'
In Boston Friday, some took the anniversary as an opportunity to protest President Trump — reusing 'No Kings' signs and shirts from last month's rallies.
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Tim Cooke, 67, from Brookline, displayed a sign reading, 'No Kings since 1776,' as he walked the Esplanade with his dog, Lucy.
'Done without for 249 years,' Cooke said. 'So let's keep it going.'
But for the most part, people set aside politics to celebrate America. Many celebrated their freedom to speak up, to work, to pursue their happiness.
The first person on the grass at the Hatch Memorial Shell Friday was Nikki Jax, 57, of New York. Jax, a woman of transgender experience, teared up as she thought about freedom.
'All the gifts of the universe were given to me after I transitioned,' Jax said. 'So freedom for me is the freedom to walk my path.'
'I love my country,' said Cathleen Curran of Lowell. 'As long as we're doing things for the country and not letting politics get in our heads, we're the greatest country.'
By mid-afternoon, hours before the Pops show was set to begin, hundreds were spread out in the Hatch Shell, the Charles River Esplanade, across the Charles in Cambridge, and bobbing on boats in the river. Doraehea Chiu, a visitor from Taiwan on a three-month trip to the US, marveled at how everyone was able to celebrate together.
'No matter whether you are rich or poor, no matter if you are a manager at the bank, or you are a worker building a house, they are really equal,' she said. 'They all enjoy it the same way. They all went to the harbor to see the fireworks.'
Members of the Wilmington Minutemen fired their muskets while marching in the 249th Independence Day Celebration parade.
Craig F. Walker/Globe Staff
Karen Lopez, 28, of Paraguay, was also eager to see how Americans celebrate, taking in a week of festivities including a parade and laser show in Wilmington, Mass., where she lives.
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'I like to explore another country and their Independence Day traditions,' she said.
Those traditions began early in Boston Friday. After thousands wearing patriotic colors recited the Pledge of Allegiance at City Hall Plaza, Boston Mayor Michelle Wu greeted the crowd and thanked military families for their service.
'Two hundred and forty-nine years ago today, from this very spot, we declared our independence,' Wu said to the crowd. 'We declared that Boston would not back down in the face of tyranny, in the face of bullying. Not to kings and not to the greatest army in the world at that time.'
The mayor then joined the parade led by the Boston Fire Department to the Old State House for the annual reading of the Declaration of Independence.
At the end of the reading, red, white, and blue confetti fell from the sky as the Frank Zarba Military Band played, and some in the crowd chanted 'USA, USA.'
Soon after, across town, others watched as the USS Constitution set off from its dock at the Charlestown Navy Yard for its annual cruise of Boston Harbor.
The world's oldest commissioned naval warship still afloat, the 228-year-old ship was undefeated in 33 military
engagements, including during the War of 1812
A hushed silence fell over the crowd in Charlestown as the ship, nicknamed 'Old Ironsides,' slowly left the dock. As it turned into the harbor, a cannon went off, producing grey smoke and a round of applause.
'I feel American now,' one onlooker said.
Hundreds gathered at Castle Island's Fort Independence Park to watch the ship's 21-gun salute.
The celebrations felt personal to Alex G. Lee, a naturalized citizen originally from South Korea. He pointed out a statue commemorating the Korean War down the boardwalk, and said the cannonade reminded him of his service.
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'This day is so meaningful, not only for the independence of the United States, he said. 'I'm celebrating everything."
The crowd listened to the reading of the Declaration of Independence during the 249th Independence Day Celebration at the Old State House.
Craig F. Walker/Globe Staff
Back in Downtown Crossing, Middlesex County Volunteers Fifes & Drums performed at the Franklin Steps. Among them was Bill Phenix, who has been playing the fife for 53 years and can recall playing it during bicentennial celebrations in 1776.
'If you told me then that I would still be doing this, I probably would have looked at you like you lost your mind,' he said. 'It's a lifelong pursuit.'
The celebrations Friday are a lifelong pursuit for many. Dorchester's Mike Williams, 58, has been coming to the Esplanade for more than half a century, since he was 6. Sharon Davis, of Machias, Maine, remembers watching the Pops on television as a kid; she first got to attend in person a few years ago. For Eli Rodriguez, 34, of Ashland, the Fourth of July is always one of the biggest days of the year for the
Jax, the first person waiting at the Hatch early Friday morning, came to Boston to see the show in 1985. She never forgot it.
'I remember it as being one of the most singular, beautiful experiences with humanity,' she said.
Christopher Huffaker can be reached at
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USA Today
an hour ago
- USA Today
How Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson is standing out from her liberal colleagues
From the Supreme Court's mahogany bench, the newest justice, Ketanji Brown Jackson, has sparred with Amy Coney Barrett and other voices of the right. Moneyed interests and power are among her targets. WASHINGTON − After Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett announced from the court's mahogany bench last month that lower court judges had gone too far in pausing President Donald Trump's changes to birthright citizenship, the court's liberals got their turn. Justice Sonia Sotomayor, the most senior of the three justices appointed by Democratic presidents, read parts of the trio's joint dissent for about twice as long as Barrett had described the conservative majority's opinion. She even added a line that doesn't appear in the written version. 'The other shoe has dropped on presidential immunity,' Sotomayor said, referencing the court's landmark 2024 decision limiting when presidents can be prosecuted for actions they take in office. But it was a separate written dissent from Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson that reverberated the most, in large part because of Barrett's scathing reaction to it. 'We will not dwell on Justice Jackson's argument, which is at odds with more than two centuries' worth of precedent, not to mention the Constitution itself,' Barrett wrote. More: Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson can throw a punch. Literally. Jackson's words repeatedly drew attention It wasn't the first time in recent months that Jackson's words drew attention. In a case about air pollution rules, Jackson said the case "gives fodder to the unfortunate perception that moneyed interests enjoy an easier road to relief in this Court than ordinary citizens.' When her conservative colleagues gave Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency complete access to the data of millions of Americans kept by the U.S. Social Security Administration, Jackson said the court was sending a 'troubling message" that it's departing from basic legal standards for the Trump administration. Speaking at a judge's conference in May, Jackson condemned the attacks Trump and his allies were making on judges who ruled against his policies. Her warning that the 'threats and harassment' could undermine the Constitution and the rule of law was stronger than concerns expressed by Sotomayor and by Chief Justice John Roberts. And during the eight months that the justices heard cases, Jackson – the court's newest member in an institution that reveres seniority – once again spoke by far the most. 'I definitely do think Justice Jackson really prioritizes developing her own jurisprudence and thoughts and voice,' said Brian Burgess, a partner at the law firm Goodwin who clerked for Sotomayor. 'I can see Justice Jackson evolving into someone that wants to speak directly to the public to express the concerns of that side of the court.' A clock, a mural, a petition: Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson's chambers tell her story Jackson spoke up early and often Nominated by President Joe Biden in 2022 to succeed Justice Stephen Breyer, Jackson wasted no time being heard. During her first two weeks on the court, she spoke more than twice as many words as any of her colleagues. When asked about her volubility, Jackson has said she became used to operating solo on the bench during her eight years as a federal trial court judge. She hasn't shown many signs of adjusting. Since October, Jackson spoke 50% more words on the bench than Sotomayor who was the next talkative, according to statistics compiled by Adam Feldman and Jake S. Truscott for the Empirical SCOTUS blog. 'She's the only one that has ever done what she's doing in terms of total volume of speech in her first few terms,' said Feldman, a lawyer and political scientist. `She wanted me my voice.' Jackson has been working on her communications skills since elementary school when her mother enrolled her in a public speaking program. 'She wanted me to get out there and use my voice,' Jackson said during an appearance at the Kennedy Center last year to talk about her memoir. And it's not just her voice. Jackson wrote more – either opinions, concurrences or dissents – this term than anyone except Justice Clarence Thomas, according to Empirical SCOTUS blog. Steve Vladeck, a professor at Georgetown University Law Center, said he is going to add her dissent in the air pollution case to his course on federal courts. 'She is calling things as she sees them,' Vladeck said on the liberal Strict Scrutiny podcast. Jackson went further than her liberal colleagues Jackson went further in that case, and in some others, than her liberal colleagues. Sotomayor wrote her own dissent of the majority's ruling that fuel producers can challenge California emissions standards under a federal air pollution law. And Kagan was in the 7-2 majority. In fact, Kagan was in the majority more often this term than all but Roberts, Barrett and Justice Brett Kavanaugh – the three conservatives who often control the direction of the court. Jackson was in the majority the least often. 'You see Justice Kagan really shifting away from Justices Sotomayor and Jackson,' legal analyst Sarah Isgur said on the podcast Advisory Opinion where she dissects the court with fellow conservatives. Different ways of being influential Burgess, the former Sotomayor clerk, disputed that. He said the times Kagan voted against both Sotomayor and Jackson were not high-profile defections. For example, in the air pollution case, Burgess suspects Kagan agreed with Jackson that the court should not have heard the fuel producers' appeal in part because their underlying complaint was likely to be addressed by the Trump administration. But once they took the case, the justices decided the legal issue in a way that didn't break a lot of new ground, he said. 'I think she seems to be more interested in coalition building and finding ways to eke out wins,' Burgess said of Kagan's overall style. 'That's one way to be influential. Another way to be influential is to try to stake out different views and hope that history comes along to your position over time.' Attack on `pure textualism' In one of Jackson's strong dissents, in a case about whether the Americans with Disabilities Act protected a disabled retiree whose health benefits were reduced, Sotomayor was on board – except for a footnote. In that lengthy paragraph, Jackson criticized her conservative colleagues' use of 'pure textualism' as 'certainly somehow always flexible enough to secure the majority's desired outcome.' 'She's saying what I think so many of us have been thinking,' Vladeck said on the podcast. He wondered whether Sotomayor didn't sign onto that footnote because she didn't agree with it or because she wanted to 'let Jackson have it for herself and not take credit for what really is an unusually strong accusation of methodological manipulation by one of the justices.' `With deep disillusionment, I dissent.' 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Newsweek
4 hours ago
- Newsweek
Some Social Security Recipients Will See Wage Garnishment in Just Weeks
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Hamilton Spectator
5 hours ago
- Hamilton Spectator
What if killing Canada's digital services tax is just the beginning for Donald Trump?
OTTAWA—Call it a prudent climbdown, a show of weakness, or an unavoidable concession. There are several ways to look at Prime Minister Mark Carney's 11th-hour decision to cancel the federal government's Digital Services Tax last weekend. But what if it's also a tangible example of exactly what Carney warned would happen? The Liberal leader won a minority government on April 28 with a pitch that no one was better placed than himself to protect Canada from Donald Trump. The U.S. president has mused about using 'economic force' to annex Canada. As if taunting or teasing this country, he questions why it exists, and keeps floating the prospect of it becoming the '51st state' of the U.S. Two days before the election, Carney spelled out how he understood all of this. 'The U.S. is trying to put economic pressure on us to gain major concessions, to the extreme of a level of integration of our countries that would impinge our sovereignty,' Carney said that day in King City, north of Toronto. Carney, in his final campaign conference, ruled out any prospect the U.S. would use military Flash forward to last week. There was Trump, posting on social media that Canada's incoming Digital Services Tax — a policy that would force American tech giants and other firms, including Canadian ones, to pay up — was nothing short of a 'blatant attack' on the United States. Trump declared he had cut off all negotiations to resolve the trade war that started earlier this year with his wave of tariffs on Canadian goods. In other words, Canada's most important commercial and military partner, the destination for 76 per cent of all exports last year , was willing to ditch talks and dictate terms that could jeopardize thousands of jobs and hundreds of billions of dollars in economic activity. All over a domestic policy the Americans didn't like. Barely 48 hours later, shortly before midnight on a Sunday, the government announced the tax was dead. Not only would Canada not implement the policy as planned, it would repeal the 2024 law that created it. Is this Trump using economic pressure to force Canada's hand? 'It is exactly that,' said Lawrence Herman, a veteran trade lawyer and special counsel with the firm, Cassidy Levy Kent. 'It's an example of, on a particular issue, how much pressure can be brought to bear to force Canada to abandon not only a policy, but a law that has been in force for 18 months.' In Herman's view, the decision looks like a 'significant retreat' by the government, which shows 'how dependent we are on a reasonable relationship' with Canada's largest trading partner. Other policies that Trump has complained about, such as the supply management system for dairy and poultry, could be next, he said. Pete Hoekstra, the U.S. ambassador to Canada, told the CBC this week that he has a 'strong belief' Canada could water down that system by changing a law designed to protect it if that becomes part of a new trade deal. 'It's not a particularly good start to this so-called new economic and security relationship,' Herman said. He was referring to Carney's stated goal of talks that are now continuing under an agreement struck at the Group of 7 summit in the Alberta Rockies last month to strive for a deal to redefine the relationship by July 21. Others have been harsher in their judgment. Lloyd Axworthy, a former Liberal foreign affairs minister, posted online that Carney was acquiescing to Trump in a way that contradicts his 'elbows up' mantra on the campaign trail. 'Forget any dreams of a more sovereign, self-directed Canada. We're doubling down on the corporate cosiness and U.S. dependency that's defined our last half-century,' he wrote on Substack. Axworthy did not respond to an interview request Thursday. For Jean Charest, a former Quebec premier who sits on the government's Canada-U.S. advisory council, the situation illustrates the 'chaos' of dealing with Trump, whose administration is grappling with trade talks and tariffs threats against most countries on the planet. This meant that Carney's government was operating 'in a world of very bad choices,' Charest said. Deciding to scrap the Digital Services Tax, in that context, was 'certainly a legitimate choice,' he said. 'We are not in an ordinary world of negotiations,' Charest added. 'It would be nice to think, 'You give, I give ... we compromise.' It doesn't work that way with Donald Trump, and we're making our way through this by trying to protect essentially what's the most important for us in the short term, and that's a negotiation that has some legs.' Charest noted that there was opposition inside Canada to the Digital Services Tax, which would have applied back to 2022 with a three per cent tax on Canadian revenues from digital services companies with more than $1.1 billion in global earnings and $20 million inside Canada. The U.S. also pushed back against the policy when Joe Biden was in power. David Pierce, vice-president of government relations with the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, said his business lobby group felt the Digital Services Tax should be paused. He also said it would have been wrong to proceed with it after the U.S. dropped a controversial provision from Trump's major budget bill last week: the so-called 'revenge tax' that would have hit the U.S. assets of foreign businesses and individuals. That decision came as the G7 agreed to exempt American firms from a co-ordinated effort to ensure corporations pay a minimum tax, which was 'absolutely a win' for the U.S. Even so, Pierce said Canada likely had no choice but to drop the policy, given Trump's exploitation of Canada's 'weakness' — its major economic reliance on trade with the U.S. 'We just hope that this now paves the way for a good renewed deal,' said Pierce. The ultimate goal of the federal government in that deal, at least publicly, has been to return to the terms of the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA), which Trump signed in 2018 during his first term, after disparaging North American free trade as unfair to his country. That would mean lifting the rounds of tariffs Trump has imposed since the winter, with import duties tied to concerns about drugs and migration over the border, and others that Trump slapped on Canadian autos, steel and aluminum in a bid to promote those sectors in the U.S. Canada has responded with countertariffs on its own that the government says hit more than $80 billion worth of American imports to Canada. Canada's lead trade negotiator with the Trump administration, Ambassador Kirsten Hillman, was not available for an interview this week, the embassy in Washington told the Star. Charest, however, said he believes it is possible that Canada could accept some level of tariffs in a July 21 deal, so long as they have no material effect. Such 'zero-effect' tariffs could only kick in at levels of trade that Canada doesn't or likely won't achieve, for example. Yet there's a question of how much any deal can be relied upon, so long as Trump is in the White House, unilaterally imposing tariffs that Canada views as 'illegal' violations of the 2018 trade deal. 'Trump is arguing about supply management and the (Digital Services Tax), but it's the U.S. that is in flagrant breach of its trade obligations. It's abandoned the CUSMA, virtually behaving as if it did not exist and the U.S. signature has no meaning,' Herman said. 'So we are in a world where rules and the rules-based system, and the stability that that treaty was supposed to provide, have gone by the board.' That means, at least for now, the Carney government is operating in a world where Canada's foremost ally, the colossus to the south, will use economic force to get what it wants.
