[Congressional Record Volume 172, Number 76 (Thursday, April 30, 2026)]
[House]
[Page H3298]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  0910
                     RHODE ISLAND INDEPENDENCE DAY

  (Mr. MAGAZINER asked and was given permission to address the House 
for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. MAGAZINER. Mr. Speaker, 250 years ago, on May 4, 1776, the people 
of Rhode Island became the first in America to declare their 
independence from the British crown.
  Two months before the signing of the Declaration of Independence in 
Philadelphia, the Rhode Island General Assembly met in Providence and 
passed an act of renunciation to separate our State's political ties 
with the English King.
  Rhode Islanders have always believed in freedom, democracy, and the 
right to chart our own course. Our State's founding document in 1663 
made us the first place in the Western Hemisphere to allow freedom of 
religion.
  In 1772, when the British Empire sent ships to enforce its unfair 
laws, we took matters into our own hands and burnt the HMS Gaspee in 
the Narragansett Bay, an act of defiance to inspire the continent to 
rise up against tyranny.
  Rhode Island did not just participate in the American Revolution. We 
launched it. Happy May 4.

                          ____________________