Boston Tea Party

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The Boston Tea Party

Most people have heard about the Boston Tea Party. When American’s dumped British Tea in Boston Harbor. But not everyone understands the importance of it, and why the Tea Party is still remembered today.

It was on December 16, 1773, when American patriots disguised as Mohawk Indians threw 342 chests of tea belonging to the British East India Company from ships into Boston Harbor. “The Americans were protesting both a tax on tea (the Townshend Acts) and the perceived monopoly of the East India Company (also the called English East India Company)” (Britannica p.1).

The Townshend Acts were a series of four acts passed by the British Parliament in an attempt to assert what it considered to be its historic right of colonial authority through suspension of a recalcitrant representative assembly and through strict collection provisions of additional revenue duties. The British-American colonists named the acts after Charles Townshend, who sponsored them. “The Suspending Act prohibited the New York Assembly from conducting any further business until it complied with the financial requirements of the Quartering Act (1765) for the expenses of British troops stationed there” (Britannica p.1). The second act, often called the Townshend duties, and imposed direct revenue duties payable at colonial ports, on lead, glass, paper, paint, and tea. It was the second time in the history of the colonies that a tax had been levied solely f...

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