Massive demonstrations swept through Boston, bigger by far than marches in many much larger cities.

Legal and ideological challenges to President Trump’s earliest initiatives emerged quickly here.

And some Massachusetts political leaders appeared to find renewed purpose, reveling in a new role after eight years of Democratic control of the White House: loyal opposition.

In the nearly three weeks since the inauguration of President Trump, the Boston area has become ground zero for a vociferous resistance effort challenging the new administration at every turn.

For Boston, of course, resistance is nothing new — you may have heard about a little to-do with the British Empire a while back. Now, some see the area as uniquely positioned to stand in opposition to Trump.

“I think you’ll see Massachusetts loud and vocal in any efforts to roll back the progress we’ve made,’’ said Attorney General Maura Healey. In federal court on Friday, Healey joined a legal challenge to an executive order restricting the travel of citizens of seven Muslim-majority nations.

“Look, it’s Massachusetts,’’ Healey said in an interview. “We’re used to seeing our people . . . be willing to fight for principles and values.’’ She said the legal challenge to the immigration order could be just the first, should Trump follow through on campaign promises she called unconstitutional.

For state and local elected officials like Healey, Boston Mayor Martin J. Walsh, and Governor Charlie Baker, a Trump presidency presents both challenges and opportunities, said Tom Whalen, a professor of social science at Boston University who studies political history.

“Sometimes it takes a political enemy to bring out the best in you,’’ Whalen said.

Along with the Massachusetts congressional delegation — Senator Elizabeth Warren and Representative Seth Moulton most vociferously — Healey and Walsh have risen to greater national prominence in recent weeks. Walsh, railing against Trump last month , offered City Hall itself as a refuge to immigrants seeking protection from Trump’s policies. Baker on Friday released a letter to Trump’s new secretary of homeland security, urging the administration to reconsider the ban.

By contrast, the mayor of Worcester apologized after a live microphone caught him calling protesters in New England’s second-largest city “freakin’ morons.’’

“Tip O’Neill really did not become Tip O’Neill as we know him until Reagan took office,’’ Whalen said, noting that the former speaker of the House rose to national prominence and cemented his local lore through his battles with President Reagan.

But Boston’s history of resistance was written long before the 1980s.

“People recognize that Massachusetts is first in the nation in so many things,’’ said Carol Rose, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts, which mounted a furious, nail-biting challenge to an executive order curtailing America-bound travel by citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries. Two federal judges in Boston issued a temporary restraining order halting the directive, though a different judge on Friday refused to extend the order. (Hours later, another federal judge, in Washington state, imposed a temporary nationwide stay on Trump’s order.)

The legal back-and-forth put Boston, once again, near the center of an effort to beat back an order some see as anti-American. For this city, that’s a familiar position.

“I think Boston is a really important player in the game for a number of reasons,’’ said Heather Cox Richardson, a history professor at Boston College. Last week, Richardson wrote a Facebook post arguing that the immigration order had the hallmarks of a “shock event,’’ designed to provide cover for unspecified other actions. The post went viral. By Thursday, it had been shared more than 80,000 times, and Richardson estimated she had a hundred media requests.

Massachusetts residents’ appetite for political analysis emerges from closely held ideas about civic virtue, Richardson said. Over hundreds of years of lineage, people here have learned to stand up against extremism on either side.

Evan Falchuk, who in 2014 founded the United Independent Party and ran for governor, said the intense reaction to Trump’s election here is born from a tradition of civic engagement and “purpose-driven politics.’’

“That intersects with the things that Trump has done that are just not American,’’ he said, such as the immigration order.

The furious opposition here presents an opportunity for Democratic politicians, Falchuk said, as well as a challenge.

“You’ve got to resist and prevent Trump from doing the things he’s doing,’’ Falchuk said, but, “in the midst of this resistance, you’ve got to be able to come up with a coherent plan for what’s next.’’

Whether the state might suffer for its insubordination remains, in some measure, an open question. Walsh openly rebuked an earlier Trump executive order that appeared to strip so-called sanctuary cities of federal funding; Healey is one of four attorneys general taking up legal arms against the president. And Governor Charlie Baker, who all but washed his hands of the presidential election once the major party nominees were chosen, came out in support of Healey’s effort.

Richardson and Whalen said there are ways Trump could inflict financial pain on Massachusetts if he chooses to. And there’s precedent for that kind of punishment: Westover Air Force Base was shuttered not long after President Nixon swept the country — save Massachusetts — in 1972.

But former Representative Barney Frank said that, realistically, there is little Trump can do to Massachusetts by way of retribution. Unlike Nixon, Trump has a whole list of cities and states that opposed him.

As a practical matter, there are few funding sources Trump will have discretion over, said Frank, who chaired the House’s banking committee. And promised spending cuts mean “Trump’s not giving that to anybody anyway.’’

Besides, Frank said, Trump has made it easier for opponents in one key way: While a typical transition might afford a new president an open mind, Trump’s first two weeks of action set all that aside.

“The way he’s acted the first couple weeks has made opposition both more important and more relevant,’’ Frank said. “People are more likely to get criticized for not standing up.’’

Nestor Ramos can be reached at nestor.ramos@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @NestorARamos.