AUSTIN — Stores in Texas can soon begin selling merchandise with curbside service and hospitals can resume nonessential surgeries.

In Florida, people returned to a few beaches and parks.

Protesters in several states are clamoring for more.

Governors eager to rescue their economies and feeling heat from President Trump are moving to ease restrictions meant to control the spread of the coronavirus, even as experts warn that moving too fast could prove disastrous.

Adding to the pressure are protests against stay-at-home orders organized by small-government groups.

They staged demonstrations Saturday in several cities after President Trump urged them to “liberate” three states led by Democratic governors.

Protests happened in Republican-led states too, including at the Texas Capitol and in front of the Indiana governor’s home.

Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott already said that restrictions will begin easing next week.

Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb — who signed an agreement with six other Midwestern states to coordinate reopening — said he would extend his stay-at-home order until May 1.

In Maryland on Saturday, cars, trucks, and motorcycles swarmed the streets of Annapolis to demand an end to the state’s coronavirus-related restrictions.

Annapolis was at a standstill as dozens of cars waited to drive around Church Circle for the protest, organized by a group called Reopen Maryland.

Caryn Abbott, a 58-year-old registered nurse and a spokesman for the group, said she helped organize the protest to urge the governor to reopen businesses, schools, and churches by May 1 — while still following Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines and protecting the vulnerable from contracting the virus.

Others who protested didn’t want to wait that long; they urged the governor to lift the restrictions immediately.

“I don’t think it’s right to limit the rights of the many to protect the few,” said Rob Dahl, a 37-year-old from Baltimore.

“This has been a planned-demic all along,” another man shouted from a megaphone through his car window. “For forced vaccinations ... I’m not wearing masks to show my submission.”

For the first time in weeks, people were able to visit some Florida beaches, but they were still subject to restrictions on hours and activities.

The rules include no sunbathing, no sitting in folding chairs, no coolers. Just walk, run, swim, fish, or surf.

Beaches in big cities stayed closed.

Meanwhile, infections kept surging in the Northeast.

Rhode Island, between the hot spots of Massachusetts and New York, has reported a steady daily increase in infections and deaths, with nursing home residents accounting for more than 90 of the state’s 118 deaths.

The state’s death rate of about 10 people per 100,000 is among the nation’s highest per capita, according to data compiled by the COVID Tracking Project.

Massachusetts had its highest number of deaths in a single day on Friday, with 159.

Gov. Charlie Baker, a Republican, cited the advice of health experts in saying states should wait until infection rates and hospitalizations decline for about two weeks before acting.

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo cited more progress in his state.

The daily increase in deaths in New York state fell below 550 for the first time in more than two weeks as hospitalizations continued to decline.

But hospitals still report nearly 2,000 new coronavirus patients per day and nursing homes remain a “feeding frenzy for this virus,” he said.

“We are not at a point when we are going to be reopening anything immediately,” Mr. Cuomo said.

In Texas, several hundred people rallied on the steps of the state Capitol to call for an end to social restrictions.

Many protesters sought an immediate lifting of restrictions and chanted “Let us work!” in a state where more than 1 million people have filed for unemployment aid since the crisis began.

The rally was organized by a host of Infowars, owned by conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, who joined protesters on the Capitol steps.

Mr. Jones is being sued in Austin over using his show to promote falsehoods that the 2012 Sandy Hook school massacre in Connecticut was a hoax.

In Indianapolis, more than 200 people stood close together outside the governor’s mansion, carrying American flags and signs demanding that Mr. Holcomb lift restrictions.

Indiana’s state health department reported 529 new coronavirus cases between April 7 and midday Friday, raising the total to more than 10,600. The number of deaths rose by 26, to 545.

Elsewhere, a few hundred demonstrators cheered and waved signs outside the Statehouse in New Hampshire, which has had nearly 1,300 cases of the virus and more than three dozen deaths through Friday.

“Even if the virus were 10 times as dangerous as it is, I still wouldn’t stay inside my home. I’d rather take the risk and be a free person,” said one of the protesters, talk show host Ian Freeman.

Mr. Trump is pushing to relax the U.S. lockdown by May 1, a plan that hinges partly on more testing.

Public health officials said the ability to test enough people and trace contacts of those who are infected is crucial before easing restrictions, and that infections could surge anew unless people continue to take precautions.

The virus is believed to have infected more than 2.3 million people worldwide.

While most recover, the outbreak has killed at least 155,000 people worldwide, according to a Johns Hopkins University tally based on figures supplied by government health authorities around the globe.

The number almost certainly underestimates the actual toll.

First Published April 19, 2020, 3:35 a.m.