Federal Government

After unknowingly working with an FBI informant for months, five men have been charged with plotting to bomb an Ohio bridge linking two wealthy Cleveland suburbs. Federal authorities Tuesday described the men as anarchists who are angry with corporate America and the government. They say the alleged plotters researched explosives and obtained what they thought was C-4 explosives. The material, in fact, was harmless and the public was never at risk because the men got it from the informant, officials said.

A federal judge in Boise, Idaho is questioning the urgency that FBI agents felt when they arrested and detained an American Muslim under a law designed to ensure that witnesses show up to testify in court. U.S. Magistrate Judge Mikel Williams questioned Department of Justice attorney Marcus Meeks during a hearing Thursday in a lawsuit brought by Abdullah al-Kidd against the federal government. Al-Kidd, a U.S. citizen, sued former Attorney General John Ashcroft and other federal officials in 2005, after he was arrested and jailed as a material witness in a terrorism-related criminal...

A legal battle between the federal government, two journalists behind an oral history project involving the Troubles in Northern Ireland, and Boston College has been playing out for months in a courtroom in US District Court in Boston. Today, in an interesting mix of timing and irony, it will play out right at Boston College, before scores of law students. The case is one of seven that US District Court Judge William G. Young will hear at Boston College Law School, part of a longstanding agreement he has had with the school - and other institutions in Greater Boston - to on occasion...

After unknowingly working with an FBI informant for months, five men have been charged with plotting to bomb an Ohio bridge linking two wealthy Cleveland suburbs. Federal authorities Tuesday described the men as anarchists who are angry with corporate America and the government. They say the alleged plotters researched explosives and obtained what they thought was C-4 explosives. The material, in fact, was harmless and the public was never at risk because the men got it from the informant, officials said.

Germany's federal government is rejecting a state governor's call that it issue joint bonds with the country's states, which could benefit from lower borrowing costs. The federal government and Germany's 16 state governments issue separate bonds, with the latter paying slightly more to borrow. Olaf Scholz, mayor of the city-state of Hamburg and a member of the opposition Social Democrats, on Thursday raised the possibility of joint so-called "Germany bonds. " Chancellor Angela Merkel's federal government has vehemently rejected calls for joint eurobonds in Europe's debt crisis,...

Vermont state officials are gearing up for the possibility of a federal government default by drawing down the federal money available now. Jim Reardon, the state's finance commissioner, told the Legislature's Joint Fiscal Committee on Thursday that while state government's cash flow is good, he doesn't want to leave any federal money already earmarked for the state left on the table in the event of a default. Vermont Public Radio reports that managers throughout state government are being told to draw down federal money before month's end, just in case the federal government defaults on...

Democratic state lawmakers are pushing a proposal that requires Ohio to set up the insurance exchange laid out in President Barack Obama's health care law. Millions of uninsured Americans will be able to buy private coverage through these online supermarkets starting in 2014, with taxpayer-provided assistance to cover the cost of premiums. The health care law requires the federal government to set up exchanges if states fail to do so. Minority Democrats have criticized the pace in which the Republican governor's administration has worked to establish an exchange.

NEW ORLEANS - A minority partner in BP's blown-out well in the Gulf of Mexico agreed yesterday to pay $90 million in a settlement with the federal government and Gulf states over the 2010 oil spill. It includes the largest civil penalty ever recovered under the federal Clean Water Act. MOEX Offshore 2007 LLC owned 10 percent interest in the Macondo well, about 50 miles off the Louisiana coast. The well blew out in April 2010, destroying the BP-leased rig Deepwater Horizon, killing 11 men and resulting in the nation's worst offshore oil spill.

Pease International Tradeport is getting a $400,000 grant from the federal government to clear the way for future development. The money from the Department of Commerce's Economic Development Administration will be used to raze a former Air Force warehouse at 80 Rochester Ave. Removal of the 153,000-square-foot building will open up 11 acres for future development. - Tom Long

HARTFORD - Attorney General Richard Blumenthal filed an appeal yesterday to block the federal government from imposing unreimbursed costs for the No Child Left Behind Act. Last month, a federal judge in New Haven dismissed the last of four claims in Connecticut's challenge that the law is unconstitutional. Blumenthal is asking the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in New York to uphold a provision of the act that bars the federal government from imposing unreimbursed costs on towns and cities.

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court will conclude one of its most significant and controversial terms in decades by taking on one more issue that has divided the nation: Arizona's crackdown on illegal immigrants. The court's final oral argument on Wednesday - Arizona v. United States - provides yet another chance for the justices to confront fundamental questions about the power of the federal government. And the rulings the court will issue between now and the end of June could dramatically alter the nation's election-year landscape.

Massachusetts will once again take center stage in the national debate over same-sex marriage as the state becomes the first to go before a United States appeals court to challenge a federal law that defines marriage as a union only of a man and a woman. The US Court of Appeals for the First Circuit in Boston on Wednesday will hear two cases that challenge the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act: The first is a lawsuit brought by 17 local plaintiffs who say it deprives them of the federal benefits that other married couples receive.

Germany's federal government is rejecting a state governor's call that it issue joint bonds with the country's states, which could benefit from lower borrowing costs. The federal government and Germany's 16 state governments issue separate bonds, with the latter paying slightly more to borrow. Olaf Scholz, mayor of the city-state of Hamburg and a member of the opposition Social Democrats, on Thursday raised the possibility of joint so-called "Germany bonds. " Chancellor Angela Merkel's federal government has vehemently rejected calls for joint eurobonds in...

MONDAY ARGUMENTS Is it too early to consider this case since the health law's penalties do not start until 2014? The central provision of the health care law, the individual mandate, requires some Americans to obtain insurance or, starting in 2014, face a penalty. A 19th-century law, the Anti-Injunction Act, forbids challenges to tax assessments until they are due. If the Supreme Court considers the individual mandate a tax, it may conclude that it cannot hear a challenge until April 15, 2015, when the first penalties become due. Both the challengers of the law and the Obama...

1773 Fed up after years of taxation by the British government and in response to the Tea Act, Colonial activists chuck East India Company tea into Boston Harbor.   1787 US Constitution is adopted, and federal government gets power to levy taxes. President Washington sends troops to western Pennsylvania to quell violent reaction to Congress's whiskey tax. 1861 To fund the Civil War, Congress establishes a federal income tax. It is allowed to expire in 1872.

NEW ORLEANS - A minority partner in BP's blown-out well in the Gulf of Mexico agreed yesterday to pay $90 million in a settlement with the federal government and Gulf states over the 2010 oil spill. It includes the largest civil penalty ever recovered under the federal Clean Water Act. MOEX Offshore 2007 LLC owned 10 percent interest in the Macondo well, about 50 miles off the Louisiana coast. The well blew out in April 2010, destroying the BP-leased rig Deepwater Horizon, killing 11 men and resulting in the nation's worst offshore oil spill.

1773 Fed up after years of taxation by the British government and in response to the Tea Act, Colonial activists chuck East India Company tea into Boston Harbor.   1787 US Constitution is adopted, and federal government gets power to levy taxes. President Washington sends troops to western Pennsylvania to quell violent reaction to Congress's whiskey tax. 1861 To fund the Civil War, Congress establishes a federal income tax. It is allowed to expire in 1872.

WASHINGTON - New York officials yesterday asked the US Supreme Court to let states enforce their antidiscrimination laws against national banks, despite arguments from the federal government that it is the only entity that can regulate those institutions. Several justices questioned whether it made sense to allow states to make laws that could be used to investigate illegal actions at banks that operate within their borders, but then only let the federal government enforce them against national banks.

A Boston Bruins goalie's decision to skip a White House ceremony with President Barack Obama because he believes the federal government is "out of control" points to a growing lack of courtesy in the country, Gov. Deval Patrick said Thursday. Patrick, a Democrat, was asked about the controversy Thursday during his monthly "Ask the Governor" program on WTKK-FM. He didn't directly criticize goalie Tim Thomas, but suggested that the snub showed disrespect toward the presidency. "He's a phenomenal hockey player and he's entitled to his views," Patrick said.