It Wasn't The Tax, It Was The Principal

 

The Boston Tea Party was a response to British taxes that raised the price of tea in the colonies, right?

Not.

The Tea Act of 1773 actually reduced the price colonists paid. The people it hurt were the smugglers. Cheaper, company-backed tea undercut their business and handed the East India Company a virtual monopoly.

Colonists had been boycotting East India Company tea, favoring smuggled tea and coffee that dodged the tax. The boycott left the company drowning in surplus and sagging profits. To rescue it, Parliament passed the Tea Act, removing certain duties for the company while keeping the three-pence tax on tea in the colonies. The result was cheaper legal tea, but with Parliament’s tax principle firmly attached.

Forty-five tons of tea were shipped to Boston, Charleston, New York, and Philadelphia.

In every city except Boston, the Sons of Liberty pressured the consignees to resign and sent the ships back to Britain. In Boston, Governor Thomas Hutchinson refused. Two of the consignees were his sons, another his nephew. Hutchinson would not allow the ships to leave without unloading and paying the tax.

Sam Adams, John Hancock, and Joseph Warren led the protests. They argued that the tax was unconstitutional because the colonies had no representation in Parliament. The other problem was practical: the Tea Act favored the East India Company and shut colonial merchants out of the trade. Why should Americans pay a tax that Parliament had eased for a powerful corporation?

Boston law required ships to unload within twenty days. On December 16, 1773, thousands gathered at Old South Meeting House, demanding that the ships be sent home. Officials refused.

That night, 150 to 200 men disguised as Mohawks dumped the tea into the harbor.

Parliament answered with the Coercive Acts, closing Boston Harbor. John Adams called the destruction “so bold, so daring” that it marked an epoch in history.

It was the first step toward independence.