THE FRONT STEPS of the Massachusetts State House have figured prominently as the site of countless protests, political ads and press conferences, including one in which a Bay State governor took a blowtorch to a fascist’s face.

Leverett Saltonstall was the governor, and the fascist was Adolf Hitler, or rather his metal likeness, lashed to the iron gates by the steps, as part of a publicity stunt to raise awareness of the need for scrap metal for the war against the Axis powers. More famously, Saltonstall also had the golden dome painted gray out of fear that it would be a target for enemy airplanes.

Those tales and others are detailed in a new book from Josh Cutler, a former Democratic lawmaker from Duxbury who joined Gov. Maura Healey’s administration earlier this year. His hiring as undersecretary for apprenticeship and work-based learning managed to draw praise from both union leaders and business groups.

Under the Golden Dome is the third book from Cutler, a lawyer and editor whose grandparents founded the Duxbury Clipper newspaper; he previously wrote two books about an 1835 abolition riot and an 1812 newspaper war in Baltimore.

The title might suggest a tell-all, describing the piercing gaze of an iron-fisted House speaker as a lawmaker considers, with some trepidation, voting against him. What readers get instead is a fun romp through nearly two centuries in State House history, stopping at 1970, just before Cutler himself was born. He hopes to eventually write a second volume.

Cutler, who spent just under a decade in the legislative branch before crossing over to the executive side, said he picked up some of the stories and related tidbits from fellow lawmakers and staffers, as well as from just ambling the halls. “It is cliche that we often take for granted what is right in front of us,” he says in the introduction. “This book is an attempt to remedy that.”

Cutler started writing in January 2023, after being diagnosed with colon cancer. To keep his mind off the unpleasantness of chemotherapy, he dove into contemporary newspapers and the archives at the State House’s library, among other sources. The story of Sylvia Donaldson, the retired schoolteacher from Brockton who became the first woman to preside over a session of the House when she temporarily took the gavel in 1926, drove him to keep digging into the building’s history.

Cutler, who says he is healthy now, also writes about a famous speech by John F. Kennedy, delivered to a joint session of the Legislature, his first public address since winning the 1960 election. The president-elect cited John Winthrop, the Puritan who helped found the Massachusetts Bay Colony, and quoted his saying, “we shall be as a city upon a hill – the eyes of all the people are upon us.” 

What many previous write-ups of the speech often miss, but Cutler does not, is crucial context: At the time, the state was reeling from public corruption scandals, involving bribery and the head of the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority. Kennedy was essentially telling the assembled lawmakers to please stop stealing. (As one reporter later noted, the message “went over their heads.”)

Cutler said his favorite chapters included the ones about Jackie Gleason, star of “The Honeymooners” television show, whose offhand joke while at the House rostrum helped kill a gambling bill, and the multiple times the Sacred Cod, the large ornament that hangs in the chamber, was stolen. The thefts that drew national attention. “Everyone knows the story, we all know the basics. But to be really able to get the details of what actually happened, that was a lot of fun for me to write,” he said.

The road ahead for Fernandes Anderson

The Boston Globe earlier this week carried a headline that asked, “How did Fernandes Anderson go from barrier-breaker to another Boston politician facing corruption charges?”

The short answer, summarizing the grand jury’s indictment last week of City Councilor Tania Fernandes Anderson, is that it was a quick walk from her City Council office to the bathroom. That’s where on a Friday afternoon in June 2023, she allegedly took a kickback from a staffer who is a relative. Fernandes Anderson has pleaded not guilty and has rebuffed calls from her colleagues to resign.

Her next steps, in and out of the federal courthouse, depend on the path she wants to take. One of her predecessors, the late Chuck Turner, was also hit with corruption charges in 2008. He declared himself innocent, blasting federal officials in press conferences, rallies, and in the media. Against his attorney’s advice, he took the witness stand, and ended up convicted by a jury.

The same federal investigation ensnared former state senator Dianne Wilkerson, who pleaded guilty and largely stayed quiet as her case played out. Days before she reported to prison, she accused, without evidence, local ministers of conspiring against her with the FBI. 

Elected in 2021, Fernandes Anderson was the first African immigrant and Muslim-American to join the 13-member council, holding a seat that includes Dorchester, Roxbury, Fenway, and part of the South End. But soon after the election, she appointed her sister as director of constituent services, and later hired her own son, too. She often aligned herself with other progressives on the council, but called herself a “lone wolf.” Her fellow councilors agreed, and ended up tossing her from the top post on their budget committee.

When the state Ethics Commission hit her with a $5,000 penalty in 2023 for hiring her relatives, Fernandes Anderson referred to the violations as a “boo boo” and added on social media, “I messed up and should have paid attention to those [ethics] training videos.” She still allegedly hired another relative, while falsely telling others in City Hall they were not related.

“Everyone knows that this is not something you can comment on,” she told reporters this week, according to the Herald. “Let’s allow due process. Let’s go through that process, and when it’s time to speak, we speak.”

She also invoked religion, as she previously has when she encountered trouble. “God has brought me to this point to deal with a very, very difficult situation,” she said.