Quicknation    Massachusetts

Images of Massachusetts: G Y AOL AV MSN Books of Massachusetts: B

Massachusetts results from: AltaVista A9 AOL Clusty Gigablast Google Lycos MSN Teoma Wisenut Yahoo

Massachusetts

The Massachusetts Bay Colony was named after the indigenous population, the Massachusett, whose name can be segmented as is a locative suffix. It has been translated as "at the great hill," "at the place of large hills," or "at the range of hills," with reference to the Blue Hills, or in particular, Great Blue Hill, located on the boundary of Milton and Canton, to the southwest of Boston.

Massachusetts officially designates itself a "commonwealth." Colloquially, it is often refered to simply as "the Commonwealth," although "state" is used interchangeably.

"A portion of the north-central Pioneer Valley near South Deerfield, much more rural than Springfield, in the southern part of the valley, or Boston, which is on the coast." A portion of the north-central Pioneer Valley near South Deerfield, much more rural than Springfield, in the southern part of the valley, or Boston, which is on the coast.

Massachusetts is bordered on the north by New Hampshire and Vermont, on the west by New York, on the south by Connecticut and Rhode Island, and on the east by the Atlantic Ocean. At the southeastern corner of the state is a large, sandy, arm-shaped peninsula called Cape Cod. The islands of Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket lie to the south of Cape Cod.

Massachusetts is known as the because of the several large bays that give its coastline its distinctive shape: Massachusetts Bay and Cape Cod Bay on the state's east coast, and Buzzards Bay to the south. A few cities and towns on the Massachusetts–Rhode Island border are also adjacent to Narragansett Bay.

Boston is the largest city, located at the inmost point of Massachusetts Bay, at the mouth of the Charles River, the longest river entirely within Massachusetts. Most of the population of the Boston metropolitan area (approximately 5,800,000) does not live in the city; eastern Massachusetts on the whole is fairly densely populated and largely suburban. Western Massachusetts is more rural and sparsely populated, especially in the Berkshires, the branch of the Appalachian Mountains which forms the western border of the state. The most populated part of western Massachusetts is the "Pioneer Valley," alongside the Connecticut River, which flows across Western Massachusetts from north to south.

- Massachusetts was the most important northern colony, as well as an important part of New England, where many American institutions and traditions were formed. Unlike southern colonies, it was built around small towns, rather than scattered farms. The Pilgrims settled the Plymouth Colony, and Puritan settlers travelled to Salem and later Boston in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. As the Puritans gradually secularized and became known as Yankees, the Congregational Church continued to dominate most small towns. Late in the colonial period Baptist and other dissenting churches emerged, and the elites in Boston and other cities turned to the Anglican and Unitarian religions. The colony defeated some Indian tribes in King Philip's War in the 1670s, and fought with Britain a series of French and Indian Wars that were characterized by brutal border raids, and successful attacks on Canada. - Massachusetts was a center of the American Revolution, with actions by the patriots and counter-actions by the Crown (including the Intolerable Acts) a main reason for unity of the 13 colonies and the outbreak of war, starting with battles around Boston in 1775-76. Also see Boston Massacre, Boston Tea Party. - On February 6, 1788, Massachusetts became the sixth state to ratify the United States Constitution. - On March 15, 1820, Maine was separated from Massachusetts, of which it had been a non-contiguous part, and entered the Union as the 23rd State. (Roman Catholic Church sex abuse scandal - In 2002, the diocese was found to have knowingly moved priests who sexually molested children from parish to parish and to have covered up abuse.Same-sex marriage: On November 18, 2003, the Supreme Judicial Court (SJC) ruled that the state could not deny marriage rights to same-sex couples under the state constitution. Co. in Dalton, Massachusetts produces the paper-like silk material used for printing Federal Reserve notes" Co. in Dalton, Massachusetts produces the paper-like silk material used for printing Federal Reserve notes

The Bureau of Economic Analysis estimates that Massachusetts's total state product in 2003 was $297 billion. Per capita personal income in 2004 was $42,102, making it the 2nd highest in the country behind Connecticut.

Its agricultural outputs are seafood, nursery stock, dairy products, cranberries, and vegetables. Its industrial outputs are machinery, electric equipment, scientific instruments, printing, and publishing. Thanks largely to the Ocean Spray cooperative, Massachusetts is the second largest cranberry producing state in the union (after Wisconsin). Other sectors vital to the Massachusetts economy include higher education, health care, financial services and tourism.

As of 2005, Massachusetts has an estimated population of 6,398,743, which is a decrease of 8,639, or 0.1%, from the prior year and an increase of 49,638, or 0.8%, since the year 2000. This includes a natural increase since the last census of 131,329 people (that is 426,232 births minus 294,903 deaths) and a decrease due to net migration of 73,741 people out of the state. Immigration from outside the United States resulted in a net increase of 162,674 people, and migration within the country produced a net loss of 236,415 people.

The population of Massachusetts in 2004 included 881,400 foreign-born residents.

The bulk of the state's population surrounds Greater Boston, with approximately 5,800,000 people, and the North and South Shores. Historically, the coast has been much more urban than Western Massachusetts, which is very rural, save for the cities of Springfield and Worcester.

The five largest reported ancestries in Massachusetts are: Irish (22.5%), Italian (13.5%), English (11.4%), French (8%), German (5.9%).

Massachusetts is the most Irish state in the nation and the only state in which people of Irish ancestry (especially in the Boston suburbs) are a plurality. Massachusetts Yankees of colonial English ancestry still have strong presence in the small towns. Franco-Bay Staters are the largest group in much of western and central Massachusetts. Boston has a large African-American population and its largest immigrant group is Haitians. Fall River and New Bedford on the south coast have large populations of people with Portuguese and Brazilian heritages, with a growing Brazilian population in the Boston area. Lowell, in the northeast of the state, is home to the second largest Cambodian (Khmer) community in the country, outside of Long Beach, California. Although most of the Native Americans intermarried or died out, the Wampanoag tribe maintains a small reservation at Aquinnah, on Martha's Vineyard and a non-recognized reservation at Mashpee. The Nipmuck maintain two state-recognized reservations in the central part of the state.

Massachusetts was initially founded and settled by staunch Puritans in the 17th century and remained a majority-Yankee state for most of its history. Today Protestants make up less than one-third of the state's population, but have a prominent role in finance, big business, the arts, education, and cultural institutions. Catholics now predominate due to massive immigration from Ireland, Quebec, Italy, Portugal, and Puerto Rico. A large Jewish population came to the Boston area 1880-1920. Mary Baker Eddy made the Boston Mother Church of Christian Science the world headquarters. The descendants of the Puritans belong to many different churches; in the direct line of inheritance are the CongregationalUnited Church of Christ and Unitarian Universalist churches. Both of these denominations are noted for their strong support of social justice, civil rights, and moral issues, including strong and early advocacy of abolition of slavery, women's liberation, and (after 2000) legal recognition of gay marriage.

The religious affiliations of the people of Massachusetts (as of 2001) are shown in the table below:

The capital of Massachusetts is Boston and the current governor is Mitt Romney (Republican). All governors of Massachusetts are given the title , a carry-over from the Commonwealth's British past, despite titles being uncommon in American political traditions. The state does not maintain an official governor's residence. Massachusetts's two U.S. senators (Since 1985) are Edward Kennedy (Democrat) and John Kerry (Democrat); as of the 2001 redistricting, Massachusetts has ten seats in the United States House of Representatives (all Democratic), giving Massachusetts the largest one-party delegation in Congress (d the "Great and General Court" and is manned mostly by Democrats; the highest court is the "Supreme Judicial Court."

Whenever a holiday falls on a Sunday it is observed on the following Monday.

* Celebrated only in Suffolk County (Boston, Chelsea, Revere, Winthrop) and the city of Somerville.

During the first half of the 1900s Boston was socially conservative, and strongly under the influence of Methodist minister J. Frank Chase and his New England Watch and Ward Society, founded in 1878. In 1903, the Old Corner Bookstore was raided and fined for selling Boccaccio's Decameron. Howard Johnson's got its start when Eugene O'Neill's Strange Interlude was banned in Boston, and the production had to be moved to Quincy. In 1927, works by Sinclair Lewis, Ernest Hemingway, John Dos Passos, and Sherwood Anderson were removed from bookstore shelves. "Banned in Boston" on a book's cover could actually boost sales. Burlesque artists such as Sally Rand needed to modify their act when performing at Boston's Old Howard. The clean version of a performance used to be known as the "Boston version." By 1929, the Watch and Ward society was perceived to be in decline when it failed in its attempt to ban Theodore Dreiser's An American Tragedy, but as late as 1935 it succeeded in banning Lillian Hellman's play The Children's Hour. Censorship was enforced by city officials, notably the "city censor" within the Boston Licensing Division. That position was held by Richard J. Sinnott from 1959 until the office was abolished on March 2, 1982. In modern times, few of such puritanical social mores persist.

Massachusetts has since gained a reputation as being a politically liberal state, and is often used as an archetype of liberalism in the U.S. Massachusetts is the home of the Kennedy family of political fame, and routinely votes for the Democratic Party in federal elections. As of 2005, it is by far the largest U.S. state represented totally by one party in the U.S. Congress. Although Republicans have held the governor's office continuously since 1991, many of these (especially William Weld, the first of the recent lineage of Republican governors) are considered among the most progressive Republicans in the nation. Two of these governors, Paul Cellucci and Jane Swift took office when their predecessors resigned to take other positions.

In presidential elections, Massachusetts supported Republicans until 1912, from 1916 through 1924, in the 1950s, and in 1980 and 1984. From 1988 through 2004, Massachusetts has supported Democratic presidential candidates, giving native son John Kerry his largest margin of victory among states with a 25 percentage point margin and 61.9% of the vote. Every county in the Commonwealth supported the Democratic candidate.

In 2002, Senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania partially blamed the Roman Catholic Church sex abuse scandal on Boston saying "...it is no surprise that Boston, a seat of academic, political and cultural liberalism in America, lies at the center of the storm." These remarks resurfaced in July of 2005 when an editorial in the Boston Globe republished Santorum's comments. Although he was heavily criticized for his remarks, Santorum not only refused to apologize, but, on August 1, 2005 he complained that Senators Edward M. Kennedy and John F. Kerry of Massachusetts "did nothing" about sexual abuse in the Catholic Church in 2002. "They spoke nothing. They sat by and let this happen," Santorum said.

During the 2004 Presidential Election, Massachusetts was the target of many GOP regionalist attacks along the campaign trail. When informed that the Democratic National Convention would be in Boston, House Majority Leader Dick Armey remarked, "If I were a Democrat, I suspect I'd feel a heck of a lot more comfortable in Boston than, say, America." While campaigning in the western part of the country, President Bush would often jab, "My opponent says he's in touch with the West, but sometimes I think he means Western Massachusetts." The stump speech that he used at many of his campaign stops included many such remarks directed at Massachusetts and New England in general.

Following a November 2003 decision of the state's Supreme Court, Massachusetts became the first (and heretofore only) state to issue same-sex marriage licenses on May 17, 2004. See the articles on same-sex marriage in the United States and same-sex marriage in Massachusetts.

John Adams, 1st Vice President of the U.S., 2nd President of the U.S., 1800 Federalist presidential nominee

There are 50 cities and 301 towns in Massachusetts, grouped into 14 counties.

Massachusetts shares with the five other New England states, plus New York and New Jersey, a governmental structure known as the New England town.

Massachusetts contains only 2.5% of the U.S. population, but is home to many of its most renowned preparatory schools, colleges, and universities[1] (see full list of colleges and universities in Massachusetts). There are 62 colleges located in the greater Boston area alone. The population of metropolitan Boston, in particular, surges during the school year (see list of colleges and universities in metropolitan Boston).

Massachusetts is known for having one of the best public school systems in the nation. It has one of the lowest high-school dropout rates in the nation and is tied with New Jersey for having the 2nd highest percentage of students who go on to college after high-school. It is also one of the highest-scoring states on advanced placement tests. In 2004, Massachusetts' high school students ranked 1st in the nation for test scores relating to the fields of math and science.

. On December 18, 1990, the Legislature decided that the people of the Commonwealth would be designated as Bay Staters.

The United States Postal Service abbreviation for Massachusetts is in honor of this state.

When the Governor dies, resigns, or is removed from office, the office of Governor remains vacant (for the rest of the 4 year term), the Lieutenant Governor doesn't succeed, only decharges powers duties as Acting Governor (for rest of the 4 year term).

The House of Representatives in Massachusetts has a wooden cod, known as the "sacred cod". A wooden cod has hung in the house chamber since the 18th century. It was given to the by local fisherman as a reminder of that important industry. The cod is filled with superstition to its owning . In 1933 it was stolen by a group of Harvard students and the House did not sit in session until the cod was returned, while a vast search operation was set underway. It was returned within a week and no one was punished. The Senate has also acquired a fish in part mocking the cod, it is called the "holy mackerel".

The front doors of the state house are only opened when a governor leaves office or a head of state comes to visit the State House. It is also traditionally opened for the return of flags from Massachusetts regiments at the end of wars. The tradition of the ceremonial door originated when leaving governor Benjamin Butler kicked open the front door and walked out by himself in 1884.

Imagining New England: Explorations of Regional Identity from the Pilgrims to the Mid-Twentieth Century