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The Tea Act of 1773 was one of several measures imposed on the American colonists by the heavily indebted British government in the decade leading up to the American Revolutionary War (1775-83). The act's main purpose was not to raise revenue from the colonies but to bail out the floundering East India Company, a key actor in the British economy. The British government granted the company a monopoly on the importation and sale of tea in the colonies. The colonists had never accepted the constitutionality of the duty on tea, and the Tea Act rekindled their opposition to it. Their resistance culminated in the Boston Tea Party on December 16, 1773, in which colonists boarded East India Company ships and dumped their loads of tea overboard. Parliament responded with a series of harsh measures intended to stifle colonial resistance to British rule; two years later the war began.

Crisis in Britain

In 1763, the British Empire emerged as the victor of the Seven Years' War (1756-63). Although the victory greatly expanded the empire's imperial holdings, it also left it with a massive national debt, and the British government looked to its North American colonies as an untapped source of revenue. In 1765, the British Parliament passed the Stamp Act, the first direct, internal tax that it had ever levied on the colonists. The colonists resisted the new tax, arguing that only their own elective colonial assemblies could tax them, and that "taxation without representation" was unjust and unconstitutional. After the British government rejected their arguments, the colonists resorted to physical intimidation and mob violence to prevent the collection of the stamp tax. Recognizing that the Stamp Act was a lost cause, Parliament repealed it in 1766.

Did you know? Each year around the anniversary of the Boston Tea Party, a re-enactment party is thrown in Boston and visitors can tour replicas of the Dartmouth, the Beaver and the Eleanor, the three ships that were docked in the Boston Harbor and loaded with the East India Company's tea.

Parliament did not, however, renounce its right to tax the colonies or otherwise enact legislation over them. In 1767, Charles Townshend (1725-67), Britain's new chancellor of the Exchequer (an office that placed him in charge of collecting the government's revenue), proposed a law known as the Townshend Revenue Act. This act placed duties on a number of goods imported into the colonies, including tea, glass, paper and paint. The revenue raised by these duties would be used to pay the salaries of royal colonial governors. Since Parliament had a long history of using duties to regulate imperial trade, Townshend expected that the colonists would acquiesce to the imposition of the new taxes.

Unfortunately for Townshend, the Stamp Act had aroused colonial resentment to all new taxes, whether levied on imports or on the colonists directly. Moreover, Townshend's proposal to use the revenue to pay the salaries of colonial governors aroused great suspicion among the colonists. In most colonies, the elective assemblies paid the governors' salaries, and losing that power of the purse would greatly enhance the power of the royally appointed governors at the expense of representative government. To express their displeasure, the colonists organized popular and effective boycotts of the taxed goods. Once again, colonial resistance had undermined the new system of taxation, and once again, the British government bowed to reality without abandoning the principle that it had rightful authority to tax the colonies. In 1770, Parliament repealed all of the Townshend Act duties except for the one on tea, which was retained as a symbol of Parliament's power over the colonies.

Saving the East India Company

The repeal of the majority of the Townshend Act took the wind out of the sails of the colonial boycott. Although many colonists continued to refuse to drink tea out of principle, many others resumed partaking of the beverage, though some of them salved their conscience by drinking smuggled Dutch tea, which was generally cheaper than legally imported tea.The American consumption of smuggled tea hurt the finances of the East India Company, which was already struggling through economic hardship. Although it was a private concern, the company played an integral role in Britain's imperial economy and served as its conduit to the riches of the East Indies. A glut of tea and a diminished American market had left the company with tons of tea leaves rotting in its warehouses. In an effort to save the troubled enterprise, the British Parliament passed the Tea Act in 1773. The act granted the company the right to ship its tea directly to the colonies without first landing it in England, and to commission agents who would have the sole right to sell tea in the colonies. The act retained the duty on imported tea at its existing rate, but, since the company was no longer required to pay an additional tax in England, the Tea Act effectively lowered the price of the East India Company's tea in the colonies.

The Destruction of the Tea

Bettmann Archive/Getty Images

If Parliament expected that the lowered cost of tea would mollify the colonists into acquiescing to the Tea Act, it was gravely mistaken. By allowing the East India Company to sell tea directly in the American colonies, the Tea Act cut out colonial merchants, and the prominent and influential colonial merchants reacted with anger. Other colonists viewed the act as a Trojan horse designed to seduce them into accepting Parliament's right to impose taxes on them. The fact that the agents commissioned by the company to sell its tea included a number of pro-Parliament men only added fuel to the fire.The Tea Act revived the boycott on tea and inspired direct resistance not seen since the Stamp Act crisis. The act also made allies of merchants and patriot groups like the Sons of Liberty. Patriot mobs intimidated the company's agents into resigning their commissions. In several towns, crowds of colonists gathered along the ports and forced company ships to turn away without unloading their cargo. The most spectacular action occurred in Boston, Massachusetts, where on December 16, 1773, a well-organized group of men dressed up as Native Americans and boarded the company ships. The men smashed open the chests of tea and dumped their contents into Boston Harbor in what later came to be known as the Boston Tea Party.

The Coercive Acts and American Independence

The Boston Tea Party caused considerable property damage and infuriated the British government. Parliament responded with the Coercive Acts of 1774, which colonists came to call the Intolerable Acts. The series of measures, among other things, repealed the colonial charter of Massachusetts and closed the port of Boston until the colonists reimbursed the cost of the destroyed tea. Parliament also appointed General Thomas Gage (1719-87), the commander in chief of British forces in North America, as the governor of Massachusetts. Since the Stamp Act crisis of 1765, radical colonists had warned that new British taxes heralded an attempt to overthrow representative government in the colonies and to subjugate the colonists to British tyranny. The Coercive Acts convinced more moderate Americans that the radicals' claims had merit. Colonial resistance intensified until, three years after Parliament passed the Tea Act, the colonies declared their independence as the United States of America. The American Revolution had begun.

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The Tea Act of 1773 was an act of Great Britain's Parliament to reduce the amount of tea held by the financially insecure British East India Company. It became a catalyst for the Boston Tea Party, which was a critical event in the lead-up to the Revolutionary War.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The Tea Act of 1773 was one of several measures imposed on the American colonists by the heavily indebted British government in the decade leading up to the American Revolutionary War (1775-83). The act's main purpose was not to raise revenue from the colonies but to bail out the floundering East India Company, a key actor in the British economy. The British government granted the company a monopoly on the importation and sale of tea in the colonies. The colonists had never accepted the constitutionality of the duty on tea, and the Tea Act rekindled their opposition to it. Their resistance culminated in the Boston Tea Party on December 16, 1773, in which colonists boarded East India Company ships and dumped their loads of tea overboard. Parliament responded with a series of harsh measures intended to stifle colonial resistance to British rule; two years later the war began.

Crisis in Britain

In 1763, the British Empire emerged as the victor of the Seven Years' War (1756-63). Although the victory greatly expanded the empire's imperial holdings, it also left it with a massive national debt, and the British government looked to its North American colonies as an untapped source of revenue. In 1765, the British Parliament passed the Stamp Act, the first direct, internal tax that it had ever levied on the colonists. The colonists resisted the new tax, arguing that only their own elective colonial assemblies could tax them, and that "taxation without representation" was unjust and unconstitutional. After the British government rejected their arguments, the colonists resorted to physical intimidation and mob violence to prevent the collection of the stamp tax. Recognizing that the Stamp Act was a lost cause, Parliament repealed it in 1766.

Did you know? Each year around the anniversary of the Boston Tea Party, a re-enactment party is thrown in Boston and visitors can tour replicas of the Dartmouth, the Beaver and the Eleanor, the three ships that were docked in the Boston Harbor and loaded with the East India Company's tea.

Parliament did not, however, renounce its right to tax the colonies or otherwise enact legislation over them. In 1767, Charles Townshend (1725-67), Britain's new chancellor of the Exchequer (an office that placed him in charge of collecting the government's revenue), proposed a law known as the Townshend Revenue Act. This act placed duties on a number of goods imported into the colonies, including tea, glass, paper and paint. The revenue raised by these duties would be used to pay the salaries of royal colonial governors. Since Parliament had a long history of using duties to regulate imperial trade, Townshend expected that the colonists would acquiesce to the imposition of the new taxes.

Unfortunately for Townshend, the Stamp Act had aroused colonial resentment to all new taxes, whether levied on imports or on the colonists directly. Moreover, Townshend's proposal to use the revenue to pay the salaries of colonial governors aroused great suspicion among the colonists. In most colonies, the elective assemblies paid the governors' salaries, and losing that power of the purse would greatly enhance the power of the royally appointed governors at the expense of representative government. To express their displeasure, the colonists organized popular and effective boycotts of the taxed goods. Once again, colonial resistance had undermined the new system of taxation, and once again, the British government bowed to reality without abandoning the principle that it had rightful authority to tax the colonies. In 1770, Parliament repealed all of the Townshend Act duties except for the one on tea, which was retained as a symbol of Parliament's power over the colonies.

Saving the East India Company

The repeal of the majority of the Townshend Act took the wind out of the sails of the colonial boycott. Although many colonists continued to refuse to drink tea out of principle, many others resumed partaking of the beverage, though some of them salved their conscience by drinking smuggled Dutch tea, which was generally cheaper than legally imported tea.The American consumption of smuggled tea hurt the finances of the East India Company, which was already struggling through economic hardship. Although it was a private concern, the company played an integral role in Britain's imperial economy and served as its conduit to the riches of the East Indies. A glut of tea and a diminished American market had left the company with tons of tea leaves rotting in its warehouses. In an effort to save the troubled enterprise, the British Parliament passed the Tea Act in 1773. The act granted the company the right to ship its tea directly to the colonies without first landing it in England, and to commission agents who would have the sole right to sell tea in the colonies. The act retained the duty on imported tea at its existing rate, but, since the company was no longer required to pay an additional tax in England, the Tea Act effectively lowered the price of the East India Company's tea in the colonies.

The Destruction of the Tea

Bettmann Archive/Getty Images

If Parliament expected that the lowered cost of tea would mollify the colonists into acquiescing to the Tea Act, it was gravely mistaken. By allowing the East India Company to sell tea directly in the American colonies, the Tea Act cut out colonial merchants, and the prominent and influential colonial merchants reacted with anger. Other colonists viewed the act as a Trojan horse designed to seduce them into accepting Parliament's right to impose taxes on them. The fact that the agents commissioned by the company to sell its tea included a number of pro-Parliament men only added fuel to the fire.The Tea Act revived the boycott on tea and inspired direct resistance not seen since the Stamp Act crisis. The act also made allies of merchants and patriot groups like the Sons of Liberty. Patriot mobs intimidated the company's agents into resigning their commissions. In several towns, crowds of colonists gathered along the ports and forced company ships to turn away without unloading their cargo. The most spectacular action occurred in Boston, Massachusetts, where on December 16, 1773, a well-organized group of men dressed up as Native Americans and boarded the company ships. The men smashed open the chests of tea and dumped their contents into Boston Harbor in what later came to be known as the Boston Tea Party.

The Coercive Acts and American Independence

The Boston Tea Party caused considerable property damage and infuriated the British government. Parliament responded with the Coercive Acts of 1774, which colonists came to call the Intolerable Acts. The series of measures, among other things, repealed the colonial charter of Massachusetts and closed the port of Boston until the colonists reimbursed the cost of the destroyed tea. Parliament also appointed General Thomas Gage (1719-87), the commander in chief of British forces in North America, as the governor of Massachusetts. Since the Stamp Act crisis of 1765, radical colonists had warned that new British taxes heralded an attempt to overthrow representative government in the colonies and to subjugate the colonists to British tyranny. The Coercive Acts convinced more moderate Americans that the radicals' claims had merit. Colonial resistance intensified until, three years after Parliament passed the Tea Act, the colonies declared their independence as the United States of America. The American Revolution had begun.

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The Tea Act of 1773 was an act of Great Britain's Parliament to reduce the amount of tea held by the financially insecure British East India Company. It became a catalyst for the Boston Tea Party, which was a critical event in the lead-up to the Revolutionary War.

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Posted on March 26, 2015, by admin

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On March 24, 1765, the British Parliament passed the Quartering Act, one of a series of measures primarily aimed at raising revenue from the British colonies in America. Although the Quartering Act did not provoke the immediate and sometimes violent protests that opposed the Stamp Act, it did prove to be a source of contention between some colonies and Great Britain during the years leading up to the Revolution.

During the Seven Years (or French and Indian) War, British military commanders in North America often found it difficult to persuade the assemblies of some uncooperative colonies to pay for the costs of housing and provisioning the soldiers sent over to fight the French. Once the war had ended, the king's advisors decided that some British troops should remain in North America, in theory to defend the colonies. Since the war had left Britain with a large national debt, it also was especially important that the colonies should pay their share of the costs of keeping these men in America.

Contrary to popular belief, the Quartering Act of 1765 did not require that colonists bivouac soldiers in their private homes. The act did require colonial governments to provide and pay for feeding and sheltering any troops stationed in their colony. If enough barracks were not made available, then soldiers could be housed in inns, stables, outbuildings, uninhabited houses, or private homes that sold wine or alcohol. The act did not provoke widespread or violent opposition, partly because significant numbers of British troops were stationed in only a few colonies and also because most colonies managed to evade fully complying with its provisions. To a certain extent the act was overshadowed by the response to the Stamp Act, also passed in 1765.

Nevertheless many American colonists saw the Quartering Act as one more way Parliament was attempting to tax them without their consent. Others suspected that the real purpose of keeping a small standing army in America - stationed in coastal cities, not on the frontier - was not for defense, but to enforce new British policies and taxes. The Quartering Act did become a divisive issue in 1766, however, after 1,500 British soldiers disembarked at New York City. The New York Provincial Assembly refused to provide funds to cover the costs of feeding and housing these men as required by the law. In response, the British Parliament voted to suspend the Provincial Assembly until it complied with the act. As it turned out, the suspension was never put into effect since the New York Assembly later agreed to allocate revenue to cover some of the costs of quartering these troops. The Quartering Act of 1765 was largely circumvented by most colonies during the years before the Revolution.

American colonists resented and opposed the Quartering Act of 1765, not because it meant they had to house British soldiers in their homes, but because they were being taxed to pay for provisions and barracks for the army - a standing army that they thought was unnecessary during peacetime and an army that they feared might be used against them.

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The Quartering Act of 1765 - History Is Fun

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On March 24, 1765, the British Parliament passed the Quartering Act, one of a series of measures primarily aimed at raising revenue from the British colonies in America. Although the Quartering Act did not provoke the immediate and sometimes violent protests that opposed the Stamp Act, it did prove to be a source of contention ...

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On April 5, 1764, Parliament passed a modified version of the Sugar and Molasses Act (1733), which was about to expire. Under the Molasses Act colonial merchants had been required to pay a tax of six pence per gallon on the importation of foreign molasses.

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The Intolerable Acts & The Boston Tea Party

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Crispus Attucks - Facts, Boston Massacre & American Revolution

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Crispus Attucks was an African American man killed during the Boston Massacre and believed to be the first casualty of the American Revolution.

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The Townshend Acts were a series of measures, passed by the British Parliament in 1767, that taxed goods imported to the American colonies. But American colonists, who had no representation in Parliament, saw the Acts as an abuse of power. The British sent troops to America to enforce the unpopular new laws, further heightening tensions between Great Britain and the American colonies in the run-up to the American Revolutionary War.

The British Crown emerged victorious from the French and Indian War in 1763, but defending the North American colonies from French expansion had proved tremendously costly to England.

Compared to Great Britain's debts, the cost of the French and Indian War to the colonists had been slight. The colonists-who arguably enjoyed a higher standard of living at the time than their British counterparts-paid less than one-twentieth the taxes of British citizens living in England.

The British government thought the colonists should help pay the cost of their protection. The British Parliament enacted a series of taxes on the colonies for the purpose of raising revenue. Early attempts, such as the Stamp Act of 1765-which taxed colonists for every piece of paper they used-were met with widespread protests in America.

Townshend Duties

The Townshend Acts, named after Charles Townshend, British chancellor of the Exchequer, imposed duties on British china, glass, lead, paint, paper and tea imported to the colonies.

Benjamin Franklin had informed the British Parliament that the colonies intended to start manufacturing their own goods rather than paying duties on imports. These particular items were chosen for taxation because Townshend thought they would be difficult things for the colonists to produce on their own. He estimated the duties would raise approximately 40,000 pounds, with most of the revenue coming from tea.

While the original intent of the import duties had been to raise revenue, Charles Townshend saw the policies as a way to remodel colonial governments. The Townshend Acts would use the revenue raised by the duties to pay the salaries of colonial governors and judges, ensuring the loyalty of America's governmental officials to the British Crown. However, these policies prompted colonists to take action by boycotting British goods.

Charles Townshend didn't live to see the measures enacted. He died suddenly in September 1767, before the detrimental effects of his signature rules could materialize.

Townshend Act Protests

The Townshend duties went into effect on November 20, 1767, close on the heels of the Declaratory Act of 1766, which stated that British Parliament had the same authority to tax the American colonies as they did in Great Britain. By December, two widely circulated documents had united colonists in favor of a boycott of British goods.

These influential pamphlets included "Letters from a Farmer in Pennsylvania," a series of essays written by Pennsylvania legislator John Dickinson and the "Massachusetts Circular Letter," a statement written by Samuel Adams and James Otis Jr. and passed by the Massachusetts House of Representatives to other colonial legislatures.

With the help of the Sons of Liberty-a secret society of American business leaders who coined the phrase "taxation without representation"-24 towns in Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island agreed to boycott British goods in January 1768.

With the exception of necessities, such as fishing hooks and wire, New England merchants agreed not to import British goods for one year. New York followed suit in April, with an even more restrictive non-importation agreement.

In response to protests and boycotts, the British sent troops to occupy Boston and quell the unrest.

Repeal of the Townshend Acts

By 1769, more than 2,000 British troops had arrived in Boston to restore order-a large number considering only about 16,000 people lived in Boston at the time.

Skirmishes between patriot colonists and British soldiers-as well as colonists loyal to the British Crown-became increasingly common. To protest taxes, patriots often vandalized stores selling British goods and intimidated store merchants and their customers.

Tensions between the colonists and British troops finally boiled over on March 5, 1770, when British soldiers shot into an angry mob, killing five American colonists in an event known as the Boston Massacre.

Little did the colonists or British soldiers know that across the ocean on the same day as the Boston Massacre, the Prime Minister of Great Britain, Lord North, had asked Parliament to repeal the Townshend Acts.

All of the Townshend Acts-except for the tax on tea-were repealed in April 1770. The tax on tea would remain a flashpoint and a contributing factor to the Boston Tea Party of 1773, in which angry colonists destroyed an entire shipment of tea in Boston Harbor. To quell resistant and punish the colonists-particularly the demonstrators in Boston-Parliament passed The Coercive Acts of 1774, which colonists referred to as the Intolerable Acts. The four Intolerable Acts included the Massachusetts Government Act, instituting an appointed government over the previously-elected, local one; the Boston Port Bill closing Boston Harbor; the Administration of Justice Act, which dictated that British officials could be tried in another colony or in England if charged with capital offenses; and the Quartering Act, which said unoccupied buildings could be used to quarter British troops. The combined force of these acts culminated in the American Revolution, which was kicked off when the " shot heard round the world" was fired on April 19, 1775, at the Battles of Lexington and Concord.

SOURCES

Charles Townshend (1725-1767); The Colonia Williamsburg Foundation.
Townshend Acts; Boston Tea Party Museum.
What we get wrong about taxes and the American Revolution. PBS News Hour. 2016.

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The Townshend Acts were a series of unpopular measures, passed by the British Parliament in 1767, that taxed goods imported to the American colonies. The laws heightened the tensions between Great Britain and the American colonists and were a precursor to the Revolutionary War.

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On March 5, 1770, tensions between the American colonists and Britain finally erupted in violence in Boston. Five Americans, including former slave Crispus Attucks were killed when British troops fired on an angry mob of colonists at the Boston customs house

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American colonists have been taxed by Parliament with duties associated with trade or commerce before, but The Stamp Act is different.

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Contents

1. Why Did the Boston Tea Party Happen?

2. Boston Massacre Enrages Colonists

3. Tea Act Imposed

4. Sons of Liberty

5. What Happened at the Boston Tea Party?

6. Boston Tea Party Aftermath

7. Who Organized the Boston Tea Party?

8. Coercive Acts

9. Second Boston Tea Party

10. First Continental Congress Is Convened

The Boston Tea Party was a political protest that occurred on December 16, 1773, at Griffin's Wharf in Boston, Massachusetts. American colonists, frustrated and angry at Britain for imposing "taxation without representation," dumped 342 chests of tea, imported by the British East India Company into the harbor. The event was the first major act of defiance to British rule over the colonists. It showed Great Britain that Americans wouldn't take taxation and tyranny sitting down, and rallied American patriots across the 13 colonies to fight for independence.

Why Did the Boston Tea Party Happen?

In the 1760s, Britain was deep in debt, so British Parliament imposed a series of taxes on American colonists to help pay those debts.

The Stamp Act of 1765 taxed colonists on virtually every piece of printed paper they used, from playing cards and business licenses to newspapers and legal documents. The Townshend Acts of 1767 went a step further, taxing essentials such as paint, paper, glass, lead and tea.

The British government felt the taxes were fair since much of its debt was earned fighting wars on the colonists' behalf. The colonists, however, disagreed. They were furious at being taxed without having any representation in Parliament, and felt it was wrong for Britain to impose taxes on them to gain revenue.
READ MORE: 7 Events That Enraged Colonists and Led to the American Revolution
Boston Massacre Enrages Colonists

On March 5, 1770, a street brawl happened in Boston between American colonists and British soldiers.

Later known as the Boston Massacre, the fight began after an unruly group of colonists-frustrated with the presence of British soldiers in their streets- flung snowballs, ice and oyster shells at a British sentinel guarding the Boston Customs House.

Reinforcements arrived and opened fire on the mob, killing five colonists and wounding six. The Boston Massacre and its fallout further incited the colonists' rage towards Britain.

Tea Act Imposed

Britain eventually repealed the taxes it had imposed on the colonists except the tea tax. It wasn't about to give up tax revenue on the nearly 1.2 million pounds of tea the colonists drank each year.

In protest, the colonists boycotted tea sold by British East India Company and smuggled in Dutch tea, leaving British East India Company with millions of pounds of surplus tea and facing bankruptcy.

In May 1773, British Parliament passed the Tea Act which allowed British East India Company to sell tea to the colonies duty-free and much cheaper than other tea companies - but still tax the tea when it reached colonial ports.

Tea smuggling in the colonies increased, although the cost of the smuggled tea soon surpassed that of tea from British East India Company with the added tea tax.

Still, with the help of prominent tea smugglers such as John Hancock and Samuel Adams -who protested taxation without representation but also wanted to protect their tea smuggling operations-colonists continued to rail against the tea tax and Britain's control over their interests.

Sons of Liberty

The Sons of Liberty were a group of colonial merchants and tradesmen founded to protest the Stamp Act and other forms of taxation. The group of revolutionists included prominent patriots such as Benedict Arnold, Patrick Henry and Paul Revere, as well as Adams and Hancock.

Led by Adams, the Sons of Liberty held meetings rallying against British Parliament and protested the Griffin's Wharf arrival of Dartmouth, a British East India Company ship carrying tea. By December 16, 1773, Dartmouth had been joined by her sister ships, Beaver and Eleanor; all three ships loaded with tea from China.

That morning, as thousands of colonists convened at the wharf and its surrounding streets, a meeting was held at the Old South Meeting House where a large group of colonists voted to refuse to pay taxes on the tea or allow the tea to be unloaded, stored, sold or used. (Ironically, the ships were built in America and owned by Americans.)

Governor Thomas Hutchison refused to allow the ships to return to Britain and ordered the tea tariff be paid and the tea unloaded. The colonists refused, and Hutchison never offered a satisfactory compromise.
READ MORE: Who Were the Sons of Liberty?
What Happened at the Boston Tea Party?

That night, a large group of men - many reportedly members of the Sons of Liberty - disguised themselves in Native American garb, boarded the docked ships and threw 342 chests of tea into the water.

Said participant George Hewes, "We then were ordered by our commander to open the hatches and take out all the chests of tea and throw them overboard, and we immediately proceeded to execute his orders, first cutting and splitting the chests with our tomahawks, so as thoroughly to expose them to the effects of the water."

Hewes also noted that "We were surrounded by British armed ships, but no attempt was made to resist us."

Did you know? It took nearly three hours for more than 100 colonists to empty the tea into Boston Harbor. The chests held more than 90,000 lbs. (45 tons) of tea, which would cost nearly $1,000,000 dollars today.

Boston Tea Party Aftermath

While some important colonist leaders such as John Adams were thrilled to learn Boston Harbor was covered in tea leaves, others were not.

In June of 1774, George Washington wrote: "the cause of Boston...ever will be considered as the cause of America." But his personal views of the event were far different. He voiced strong disapproval of "their conduct in destroying the Tea" and claimed Bostonians "were mad." Washington, like many other elites, held private property to be sacrosanct.

Benjamin Franklin insisted the British East India Company be reimbursed for the lost tea and even offered to pay for it himself.

No one was hurt, and aside from the destruction of the tea and a padlock, no property was damaged or looted during the Boston Tea Party. The participants reportedly swept the ships' decks clean before they left.

Who Organized the Boston Tea Party?

Though led by Samuel Adams and his Sons of Liberty and organized by John Hancock, the names of many of those involved in the Boston Tea Party remain unknown. Thanks to their Native American costumes, only one of the tea party culprits, Francis Akeley, was arrested and imprisoned.

Even after American independence, participants refused to reveal their identities, fearing they could still face civil and criminal charges as well as condemnation from elites for the destruction of private property. Most participants in the Boston Tea Party were under the age of forty and sixteen of them were teenagers.

Coercive Acts

But despite the lack of violence, the Boston Tea Party didn't go unanswered by King George III and British Parliament.

In retribution, they passed the Coercive Acts (later known as the Intolerable Acts) which:

closed Boston Harbor until the tea lost in the Boston Tea Party was paid for

ended the Massachusetts Constitution and ended free elections of town officials

moved judicial authority to Britain and British judges, basically creating martial law in Massachusetts

required colonists to quarter British troops on demand

extended freedom of worship to French-Canadian Catholics under British rule, which angered the mostly Protestant colonists

Britain hoped the Coercive Acts would squelch rebellion in New England and keep the remaining colonies from uniting, but the opposite happened: All the colonies viewed the punitive laws as further evidence of Britain's tyranny and rallied to Massachusetts' aid, sending supplies and plotting further resistance.

Second Boston Tea Party

A second Boston Tea Party took place in March 1774, when around 60 Bostonians boarded the ship Fortune and dumped nearly 30 chests of tea into the harbor.

The event didn't earn nearly as much notoriety as the first Boston Tea Party, but it did encourage other tea-dumping demonstrations in Maryland, New York and South Carolina.

First Continental Congress Is Convened

Many colonists felt Britain's Coercive Acts went too far. On September 5, 1774, elected delegates from all 13 American colonies except Georgia met in Carpenter's Hall in Philadelphia for the First Continental Congress to figure out how to resist British oppression.

The delegates were divided on how to move forward but the Boston Tea Party had united them in their fervor to gain independence. By the time they adjourned in October 1774, they'd written The Declaration and Resolves which:

censured Britain for passing the Coercive Acts and called for their repeal

established a boycott of British goods

declared the colonies had the right to govern independently

rallied colonists to form and train a colonial militia

Britain didn't capitulate and within months, the "shot heard round the world," rang out in Concord, Massachusetts, sparking the start of the American Revolutionary War.

Sources

A Tea Party Timeline: 1773-1775. Old South Meeting House.
The Boston Tea Party. The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation.
The Boston Tea Party. Massachusetts Historical Society.
The Boston Tea Party, 1773. EyewitnesstoHistory.com.
The Intolerable Acts. U.S.History.org.

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The Boston Tea Party was a political protest staged on December 16, 1773 at Griffin's Wharf in Boston, Massachusetts. American colonists, frustrated at Britain for imposing "taxation without representation," dumped 342 chests of British tea into the harbor. The event was the first major act of defiance to British rule over the colonists.