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Tea — The Way of TeaLesson 6 of 16

The Boston Tea Party

Goal: After this lesson you can explain how British tea taxes led to the Boston Tea Party and what it cost. Subject: Social Studies | Run time: about 7 minutes

Quick recall

Last time we traced tea from medicine to ceremony. Two quick questions. One: who wrote the first comprehensive treatise on tea, and what was it called? Lu Yu, in 760 CE, wrote the Cha Jing, the Classic of Tea (Lu Yu, 760 CE). Two: who codified the Japanese tea ceremony, chanoyu, in the 1500s? Sen no Rikyu, around the idea of wabi-sabi (Sen, 1998).

Why this matters

By 1750, tea was so important to Britain that taxes on it provided about 10 to 15 percent of the entire British government's revenue (Rappaport, 2017). Hold that number. When a single leaf is paying for that much of a government, the government will fight to keep taxing it, and the people paying will eventually fight back.

The idea

The trouble built up over more than a century of law. First came the Navigation Acts, passed between 1651 and 1696, which required that all colonial tea pass through London (Rappaport, 2017). That gave Britain control of the trade and pushed colonial prices up. Then, in 1767, the Townshend Acts placed a direct duty on the colonies of 3 pence per pound of tea (Carp, 2010; Rappaport, 2017). That was a tax the colonists could feel and could not vote on. The final spark was the Tea Act of 1773. It gave the East India Company a monopoly on the tea sold to the colonies (Carp, 2010). Even though it could lower the price, it kept the principle the colonists hated, that Britain could tax them without their consent (Carp, 2010). So on December 16, 1773, a group of colonists in Boston went down to the harbor and dumped the tea into the sea (Carp, 2010). They destroyed 342 chests, about 92,000 pounds of tea, worth about 12,000 pounds sterling, which is roughly 1.8 million dollars in today's money (Carp, 2010; Rappaport, 2017). Britain answered hard. In 1774, Parliament passed the Coercive Acts, which the colonists called the Intolerable Acts, and they closed Boston Harbor (Carp, 2010). Shutting the harbor choked the city's trade and punished thousands of people, not just the ones who threw the tea. And here is a quiet twist. After the protest, colonial coffee drinking rose, because drinking tea now looked like siding with Britain (Carp, 2010).

Picture it

Picture the harbor at night. Men step onto three ships, break open 342 wooden chests, and pour 92,000 pounds of tea leaves into the cold water until the surface goes dark with it. That is about 1.8 million dollars in modern value, gone in a few hours (Carp, 2010; Rappaport, 2017). Then picture the response, soldiers and an order from London that shuts the whole harbor down. One act of dumping, and a city is sealed off.

Remember this

The fact to carry out: the Boston Tea Party was not random anger. It sat at the end of a long chain of tax laws, from the Navigation Acts to the Townshend duty to the Tea Act, and it triggered a hard reply that closed Boston Harbor (Carp, 2010; Rappaport, 2017). A tax on one drink helped push a colony toward revolution.

Quick check

Quick check. On December 16, 1773, how much tea was destroyed in Boston, and what was it worth? 342 chests, about 92,000 pounds of tea, worth about 12,000 pounds sterling, around 1.8 million dollars today (Carp, 2010; Rappaport, 2017).

Key Takeaways

  • By 1750, tea taxes provided about 10 to 15 percent of British government revenue (Rappaport, 2017).
  • A chain of laws built the conflict: the Navigation Acts (1651 to 1696), the Townshend Acts of 1767 with a 3 pence per pound duty, and the Tea Act of 1773 granting the East India Company a monopoly (Carp, 2010; Rappaport, 2017).
  • On December 16, 1773, colonists destroyed 342 chests, about 92,000 pounds of tea, worth about 12,000 pounds sterling, around 1.8 million dollars today (Carp, 2010; Rappaport, 2017).
  • The 1774 Coercive, or Intolerable, Acts closed Boston Harbor in response (Carp, 2010).
  • After the protest, colonial coffee drinking rose (Carp, 2010).

Sources

  • Carp, B. L. (2010). Defiance of the patriots: The Boston Tea Party and the making of America. Yale University Press.
  • Lu Yu. (760 CE). The classic of tea (trans. Carpenter, 1974). Ecco Press.
  • Rappaport, E. (2017). A thirst for empire: How tea shaped the modern world. Princeton University Press.
  • Sen, S. (1998). The Japanese way of tea: From its origins in China to Sen Rikyu. University of Hawai'i Press.
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The Boston Tea Party · ElementaryMBA