Commonwealth - from England? 
Rather a lot of the people who went and lived in the Bay Colony would have preferred that England had not recently ceased being its first Commonwealth.

Might that be the reason the state eventually took that style and continued in that fashion?

From this distance one of the striking features of the commonwealth is the presence of the FSF HQ there, and another is that recently it was the least craven state WRT Microsoft.  The liberal tradition is remarked upon.

Medically, the town of Framingham is one of the most carefully studied populations and much work on prevention of cardiovascular disease is at least partly based on it.  Worthy of note and cross-linking perhaps?

I don't live anywhere near it, so I'll leave this here for thought.   09:45, 30 May 2005 (BST)