The Tea Act

Although British soldiers were still in America and the Townshend duty on tea was still the law, a relative calm existed between the British government and the colonies in 1773. At this time, Parliament decided to create the Tea Act as a way to help a trading company in London.

The East India Company was once one of England’s oldest and most successful trading companies (a company that buys products in one country and sells them in another). The company was going to go out of business in the years after the French and Indian War (known globally as the Seven Years’ War). The British Parliament passed the Tea Act in May 1773 to help the company. This gave the East India Company a tax break on their tea, which made it cheaper than tea that was being smuggled into the colonies from other places. This encouraged colonists to buy tea from the East Indian Company, since it would now be cheaper. Colonists would have to pay the Townshend tax on this tea, but it was still cheaper than the smuggled tea.

Consequences of the Tea Act

Parliament did not pass the Tea Act as a way to make money. However, some colonists felt that the act was a way to get them to pay the hated Townshend duty on tea. This would go against their belief that only colonial governments could tax the colonies. Some American colonists became very frustrated. Ships carrying the company’s tea arrived in Philadelphia and New York but chose to return to England without unloading rather than face angry mobs.

In Massachusetts, however, the royal governor (governor appointed by the British) refused to allow the ships carrying the company’s tea to leave the harbor without first paying the duty on the tea. On the evening of December 16, 1773, protesters, some disguised as Native Americans, boarded three ships in Boston Harbor and threw 342 chests of East Indian Company tea into the water. This was a large loss for the East India Company. The tea was worth well over $1,000,000 today.

The Boston Tea Party inspired other similar actions. Protests occurred in Edenton, North Carolina and Yorktown, Virginia. News of the destruction of the tea caused outrage in England. Instead of repealing the Tea Act, Parliament decided to punish Boston and the people of Massachusetts. They closed the port of Boston in June of 1774 along with issuing the Intolerable Acts. This gave the colonies one more reason to resent Parliament and move a step closer to declaring their independence.

Cooper. “Boston Tea Party.” The History of North America. London: E. Newberry, 1789.Engraving. Plate opposite p. 58. Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress

Student Inquiry

1. Why did Parliament pass the Tea Act? What could they have done instead?
2. Do you think the colonists’ reaction to the Tea Act was justified? Why or why not?
3. What effect did the Boston Tea Party have on other colonies?

Next:

• Yorktown Tea Party
• Intolerable Acts