At best, America’s democracy is in decline.
The Trump administration has illegally incarcerated citizens, deported citizens and legal residents without due process, pressured universities, law firms, and businesses to make payments to a Trump-controlled entity/threatened retaliation, and used federal prosecutorial power to pursue former officials who opposed him. Taken together, these actions have led many historians, legal scholars, and a substantial fraction of Americans to conclude that the United States is no longer a democracy.
Federal abuses now occur faster than courts can respond, and federal judges have found that the administration has failed to comply with multiple federal court orders. Congress and the Supreme Court—institutions designed to check presidential overreach—have instead enabled an unprecedented accumulation of executive power. When our government becomes an instrument of oppression, it forfeits its moral authority. Obedience is not integrity—it is complicity.
As Thomas Paine wrote in Common Sense (1775),
“…government even in its best state is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one…”
Conventional tools cannot restrain a President who rejects the constitutional limits that nearly every previous President has honored.
Massachusetts is not powerless. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court has repeatedly affirmed that the Massachusetts Constitution—the oldest continuously operating written constitution in the world—grants rights that are independent of, and frequently broader than, those in the U.S. Constitution.
Protecting those rights is not optional. It is the Governor’s sworn duty.
This is not the first time Massachusetts has confronted a government that abandoned justice. In 1775, King George III’s laws served tyranny, not liberty. The people of this Commonwealth understood they had a moral obligation to resist, and that act of resistance led to the creation of a 2.5 century old democracy—a nation long regarded as a global inspiration for liberty and self-government.
We are again at such a moment when the survival of a government designed to protect and serve We the People must be actively defended.
“…let a crown be placed thereon, by which the world may know, that so far as we approve of monarchy, that in America THE LAW IS KING. For as in absolute governments the King is law, so in free countries the law OUGHT to be King; and there ought to be no other. But lest any ill use should afterwards arise, let the crown at the conclusion of the ceremony, be demolished, and scattered among the people whose right it is.” Common Sense
To fulfill her oath, Governor Healey must be prepared to take actions once considered politically unthinkable but now necessary to protect the constitutional rights, safety, and liberties of Massachusetts residents. That effort begins with establishing clear red lines and building the operational capacity to respond immediately when they are crossed.
Massachusetts’ Red Lines
The following federal actions violate the Massachusetts Constitution and must trigger a decisive state response:
- Militarization or the use of force against Massachusetts residents.
- Federal interference in the Massachusetts electoral process.
- Federal actions that curtail rights guaranteed by the Massachusetts Constitution—including due process, liberty, equality, safety, free speech, and access to evidence-based education.
- Retaliatory or punitive measures targeting any Massachusetts educational institution, business, or public employee.
- Federal restrictions on academic freedom within Massachusetts institutions.
Crossing any of these lines should compel the Commonwealth to assert its constitutional authority through legal, political, and, when necessary, nonviolent physical interposition—just as Massachusetts patriots did when faced with tyranny in 1775.
Mechanisms the Governor Should Implement Immediately
Establish constitutional boundaries through the courts.
Request a Supreme Judicial Court ruling clarifying the extent to which federal officials can be restrained under the Massachusetts Constitution when they violate state constitutional rights.
Require transparency and accountability from federal agents.
Issue an executive order mandating that all federal law-enforcement personnel operating in Massachusetts display visible identification, refrain from covering their face, and file operational plans with the state prior to conducting any enforcement action.
Reinforce state due-process protections.
Amend Massachusetts law to prohibit ICE or any federal agency from detaining individuals without a warrant signed by a Massachusetts judge.
Create a 24/7 constitutional crisis response unit.
Assemble a rapid-response team—including a representative of the Governor, the Attorney General, constitutional scholars, communications experts, and community representatives—to publicly respond, in real time to violations of state constitutional rights.
Withhold state cooperation from unlawful federal operations.
Direct all state agencies and law-enforcement bodies to refuse participation in any federal activity that may infringe upon the rights of Massachusetts residents.
Maintain exclusive control of the Massachusetts National Guard.
Assign Guard units to essential state missions, consistent with the Governor’s constitutional authority as commander-in-chief of the Massachusetts National Guard, so as to ensure they are unavailable for federal deployment.
Rebuild the Massachusetts State Defense Force (MSDF).
Reactivate the MSDF and deploy trained MSDF members between protesters and federal agents to prevent violence and protect peaceful demonstrators.
Empower residents with documentation tools.
Create a secure, state-managed platform for uploading video or photographic evidence of civil-rights violations by federal officers.
Establish rapid, on-the-ground reporting.
Create a 24-hour hotline for reporting illegal or abusive ICE activity, directly connected to state and local police.
Track federal enforcement actions in real time.
Maintain a public, continuously updated map of verified ICE and federal enforcement operations across the Commonwealth.
Protect the privacy of Massachusetts residents.
Reassert that Massachusetts will not share voting data, health information, or other protected personal data with the federal government.
Build a multi-state pro-democracy coalition.
Convene a weekly interstate alliance to coordinate legal strategies, intelligence sharing, and unified responses to federal overreach.
Communicate with the public consistently and transparently.
The Governor should hold frequent public briefings—similar to Governor Cuomo’s COVID-era press conferences—to counter misinformation in real time, and strengthen public trust.
Safeguard federal program funding.
Establish a federal tax escrow account into which all federal tax remittances collected by the Commonwealth or owed by individuals and businesses to the federal government would be deposited. These funds would be used to support federally funded programs whose grants were rescinded without Congressional authorization. Assert that the state will assume legal and financial responsibility for residents and businesses that comply with this mandate.
Safeguard the electoral process
All-party primaries. All candidates competed in a single primary and the two candidates with the greatest number of votes compete in the general election.
Rank-choice voting: If no candidate wins a majority in the election then the last-place candidate is dropped and their votes transfer to the voter’s next choice until someone has a majority.
A greatly expanded House of Representatives: 8,300 House of Representatives Will Help Fix America’s Democracy
Democracy Docket recommends blue states immediately enact these electoral protections.
- Enact a statutory right to vote for every eligible citizen.
- Ban signature matching of mail-in ballots.
- Count all ballots postmarked by Election Day.
- Guarantee voters they will not have to wait more than 30 minutes in line.
- Ban third-party voter challenges and other forms of vigilantism.
- Provide criminal and civil remedies for voter intimidation.
- Revise and strengthen election-certification laws.
A Time for Action
Massachusetts cannot rely on political norms, federal institutions, or a legal system that has failed to restrain an authoritarian presidency.
The Governor must instead lead a multifaceted defense—legal, institutional, civic, and financial—rooted in constitutional duty and executed with moral clarity. She must set aside outdated rules, political hierarchies, and conventions that no longer defend the rule of law and adopt new strategies to defeat authoritarianism.
Massachusetts has defended freedom before. It can—and must—do so again.
We must not be the generation that allows democracy to die in America—nor the one that bequeaths autocracy to our children and grandchildren.
Hayward Zwerling
November 15, 2025
Additional suggestions and a fully annotated version of this essay can be read at: A Governor’s Guide to Protecting Democracy
The associated essay is: How to Destroy a Democracy: The Authoritarian Playbook
Addendum:
11/29/2025: additions and editorial revisions.