They rallied against tax hikes, against abortion rights, against the notion that global warming was man-made and for gun rights.

Protesters who gathered in the sun yesterday morning in Oakland addressed a mixed bag of conservative causes. But the underlying theme of the Independence Day Tea Party protest on Flagstaff Hill in Schenley Park was the belief that there should be "less government in our lives," said Jeff Steigerwalt, an organizer of the event.

"We don't believe government should be bailing out companies and people," said Mr. Steigerwalt, of Franklin Park. The Pittsburgh gathering was one of nearly 1,500 events held yesterday around the country, according to Taxed Enough Already, the group that organized the protests inspired by the Revolutionary-era Boston Tea Party. Local organizers estimated the crowd in Schenley Park at about 1,100 people, said Mr. Steigerwalt.

The event had the look of a Fourth of July picnic, as attendees -- ranging from face-painted youth to seniors -- donned tank tops and polo shirts in patriotic hues and waved American flags. But protest signs -- comparing President Barack Obama to Italian fascist dictator Benito Mussolini and suggesting that his election was "suicide" for the country -- had a rougher, less celebratory edge.

Michel Sadaka, an engineer from Cranberry, said he came to the protest to express his discontent with a number of issues, from stimulus spending to cap-and-trade legislation and massive deficit spending, "to name a few."

Sporting a polo shirt printed with dramatic images -- an eagle, an American flag rippling in the wind and the text of the Declaration of Independence -- he said he views a tax hike as an assault on American ideals.

"I'm not happy with the way things are," he said. "It's an attack on the Constitution. It's an attack on the freedoms that American citizens are used to."

Romana Kerr, a dentist from Upper St. Clair, said the president's plans for universal health care frightented her and summoned bad memories of her native Czech Republic, which was a communist country when she left in 1970.

"I came from a socialist country and I came to escape the socialism there," she said. "National health care is communism because they'll control every aspect of your life."

George Doernberger, a trucker from Emsworth and a smoker, said he was frustrated that the president promised lower taxes during his campaign but then passed a national cigarette tax hike.

Keynote speaker Grover Norquist, president of Washington, D.C.-based Americans for Tax Reform, which opposes efforts to increase income taxes, called for more hands-off government. He railed against what he called government meddling with the economy, saying he does not believe the recent stimulus bill would be effective.

"(Citizens) want one thing from the central government, and that's to be left alone," he said.