The Boston Tea Party was a political protest and trade protest by Sons of Liberty in Boston, Massachusetts, on December 16, 1773. Deviated from the Tea Law of May 10, 1773, which enabled the British East India Company to sell tea from China in the American colonies without paying taxes, underestimating local tea traders, demonstrators, some disguised as Native Americans, destroying the entire delivery of tea sent by the East India Company.
They boarded the ship and threw the tea chest to Boston Harbor. The British government responded loudly and the episode rose into the American Revolution. Tea Party became an iconic event of American history, and since then other political protests such as the Tea Party movement have referred to themselves as the historical successors of the Boston protests of 1773.
The Tea Party was the culmination of a resistance movement across the UK against the British Tea Act, which was passed by the British Parliament in 1773. The colonists objected to the Tea Law because they believed it violated their rights as British people for "no tax without representation" , that is, to be taxed only by their own elected representatives and not by the British parliament in which they are not represented. In addition, the well-connected East India Company has gained a competitive advantage over importers of colonial tea, who hate the move and are afraid of additional violations in their business. The protesters managed to prevent the demolition of tea in three other colonies, but in Boston, the Royal Governor Thomas Hutchinson refused to allow the tea to be returned to England.
The Boston Tea Party is an important event in the growth of the American Revolution. Parliament responded in 1774 with the Victim's Ordinance, or Unsolent Measures, which, among other provisions, ended local self-government in Massachusetts and closed down Boston's trade. The colonists ascended and descended the Thirteen Colonies in turn responding to the Victim's Law with additional protest actions, and by holding the First Continental Congress, who petitioned the king of England to revoke the measures and coordinate colonial resistance to them. The crisis escalated, and the American Revolutionary War began near Boston in 1775.
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The Boston Tea Party emerged from two problems facing the British Empire in 1765: the financial matters of the British East India Company; and the ongoing dispute over the extent to which the authority of Parliament, if any, of the British colonies in America without placing any elected representation. The Northern Ministry's efforts to resolve this issue resulted in a confrontation that would ultimately result in a revolution.
Tea trade to 1767
When Europeans developed a taste of tea in the 17th century, rival companies were formed to import products from China. In Britain, the Parliament granted the East India Company a monopoly on the import of tea in 1698. When tea became popular in the British colony, Parliament sought to eliminate foreign competition by issuing legislation in 1721 requiring the colonies to import their tea only from Great Britain. East India Company does not export tea to colonies; by law, the company was asked to sell its wholesale tea at an auction in England. British companies buy this tea and export it to the colonies, where they sell it back to merchants in Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and Charleston.
Until 1767, East India Company paid a 25% tax on ad valorem for tea imported into the United Kingdom. Parliament put an additional tax for tea sold for consumption in the UK. This high tax, combined with the fact that tea imported into the Republic of the Netherlands is not taxed by the Dutch government, means that Englishmen and British Americans can buy smuggled Dutch teas for a much cheaper price. The biggest market for forbidden teas is the British - in the 1760s East India Company lost  £ 400,000 per year for smugglers in Britain - but Dutch tea was also smuggled into the United States of America in significant quantities.
In 1767, to help the East India Company compete with smuggled Dutch tea, the Parliament passed the Compensation Act, which lowered the tax on tea consumed in the United Kingdom, and gave East India Company a 25% refund of the provided tea - export to the colony. To help offset this loss of government revenues, Parliament also passed Townshend Revenue Act of 1767, which levied new taxes, including tea taxes, in the colonies. Instead of solving the problem of smuggling, Townshend's task renewed the controversy over Parliament's right to tax the colony.
Townshend crisis crisis
The controversy between the British and the colonies emerged in the 1760s when Parliament sought, for the first time, imposing direct taxes on the colony for the purpose of increasing revenues. Some colonists, known in the colony as Whig, object to the new tax program, arguing that it is a violation of the English Constitution. British and British residents agree that, according to the constitution, British citizens can not be taxed without the consent of their elected representatives. In the United Kingdom, this means that taxes can only be collected by Parliament. However, the colonists did not elect members of Parliament, and thus the American Whigs argued that the colonies were not taxable by the agency. According to Whig, the colonists can only be taxed by their own colonial assemblies. The colonial protests resulted in the withdrawal of the Stamp Act in 1766, but in the 1766 Declaration Act, Parliament continued to insist that they have the right to make laws for the colony "in all cases."
When the new tax was collected in the Townshend Revenue Act of 1767, Whig's colony responded with protests and boycotts. Traders organize non-import agreements, and many colonies promise not to drink English tea, with activists in New England promoting alternatives, such as domestic Labrador tea. Smuggling continues, especially in New York and Philadelphia, where tea smuggling is always wider than in Boston. The dirty English tea continued to be imported into Boston, however, mainly by Richard Clarke and the sons of Massachusetts Governor Thomas Hutchinson, until pressure from the Massachusetts Whigs forced them to abide by non-import agreements.
Parliament finally responded to the protests by withdrawing the Townshend tax in 1770, except for the tea assignment, to which Prime Minister Lord North continued to affirm "the right to tax America". The partial revocation of this tax was sufficient to end the non-import movement in October 1770. From 1771 to 1773, English tea was once again imported into the colony in significant quantities, with traders paying Townshend's levy three cents per pound. Boston is the largest legal importer of tea in the colonial; smugglers still dominate markets in New York and Philadelphia.
Maps Boston Tea Party
Tea Tea of ​​1773
The Indemnity Act of 1767, which gave East India Company a refund of tea duties re-exported to the colony, ended in 1772. Parliament passed a new law in 1772 that reduced this refund, effectively leaving 10% of the duty on tea imported to English. The action also restored tea taxes in England which had been repealed in 1767, and left three Townshend pence duties in the colonies. With the new tax burden raising UK tea prices, sales plummeted. Companies continue to import tea into the UK, however, accumulating a large surplus of products that will not be bought by anyone. For these and other reasons, by the end of 1772, the East India Company, one of Britain's most important commercial institutions, was in a serious financial crisis. The severe famine in Bengal from 1769 to 1773 has drastically reduced the earnings of the Indian East Company from India which brought the Company to the brink of bankruptcy and the Tea Act of 1773 enacted to assist the East India Company.
Eliminating some taxes is one of the real solutions to the crisis. The East India company initially sought to get Townshend's job removed, but the Northern ministry did not want to because such an action might be interpreted as quitting the Parliamentary position that it has the right to tax the colony. More importantly, the taxes collected from Townshend's duties were used to pay the salaries of some governors and colonial judges. In fact this is the purpose of the Townshend tax: these officials had previously been paid for by the colonial assembly, but Parliament now paid their salaries to keep them dependent on the British government rather than allowing them to be accountable to the colonists.
Another possible solution to reduce the tea mounds in the East India Company warehouse is to sell them cheaply in Europe. This possibility was investigated, but it was determined that the tea would be smuggled back to Great Britain, where it would sell fewer tax products. The best market for East India Company surplus tea, apparently, is the American colonies, if a way can be found to make it cheaper than smuggled Dutch tea.
The Northern Ministry's solution was the Tea Act, which received King George's approval on May 10, 1773. This action restored the East India Company's full refund of the obligation to import tea into the UK, and also allowed the company, for the first time, to export tea to the colony at his own account. This will allow companies to reduce costs by eliminating middlemen who buy tea at a wholesale auction in London. Instead of selling to an intermediary, the company now appoints colonial merchants to accept the tea as a consignment; the recipients will sell tea for a commission. In July 1773, tea recipients were selected in New York, Philadelphia, Boston, and Charleston. The Thr Tea Act in 1773 allowed the sending of 5,000 tea chests (250 tons) to the American colonies. There will be a tax of £ 1,750 to be paid by the importer when the cargo landed. The action gave EIC a monopoly on selling cheaper tea than smuggled tea; Its hidden purpose is to force the colonists to pay 3 cents tax on every pound of tea.
The Tea Act thus maintains Townshend's three-pence duty over tea imported to the colony. Some members of Parliament want to eliminate this tax, arguing that there is no reason to provoke other colonial controversies. Former Chancellor of the Exchequer William Dowdeswell, for example, warns Mr. North that America will not receive tea if Townshend's duties remain. But the North did not want to give income from Townshend taxes, mainly because it was used to pay the salaries of the colonial officials; maintaining the right of taxing Americans is a secondary matter. According to historian Benjamin Labaree, "The stubborn North man unwittingly hammed a nail in the old British Royal coffin."
Even with Townshend's obligations in effect, the Tea Law would allow the East India Company to sell tea cheaper than before, underestimating the price offered by smugglers, but also underestimating importers of colonial tea, who pay taxes and do not receive refunds. In 1772, Bohea was imported legally, the most common type of tea, sold for about 3 shillings (3s) per pound. After the Tea Act, the recipients of the colonial goods will be able to sell it for 2 shillings per pound (2s), just below the price of smugglers 2 shillings and 1 cent (2s 1d). Realizing that Townshend's duty payments were politically sensitive, the company hoped to hide taxes by making arrangements to pay them either in London after the tea landed in the colony, or had the recipients quietly paying for the duties after the tea was Sold. This attempt to hide taxes from the colonists was unsuccessful.
Refuse Tea Law
In September and October 1773, seven ships carrying East India Company tea were sent to the colonies: four were transported to Boston, and one each to New York, Philadelphia, and Charleston. On the ship there are more than 2,000 chests containing nearly 600,000 pounds of tea. Americans learn the details of the Tea Act when the ships are on the way, and the clashes begin to rise. Whigs, sometimes calling themselves Sons of Liberty, begin a campaign to raise awareness and to convince or force recipients to resign, in the same way that stamp distributors are forced to resign in the 1765 Stamp Act crisis.
The protest movement that culminated with the Boston Tea Party was not a high tax dispute. The price of imported tea legally was actually reduced by the Tea Act of 1773. The protesters were even worried about various other problems. The no known "no representation of taxation" argument, along with the question of the level of authority of Parliament in the colonies, remains prominent. Samuel Adams considers British tea monopoly "equal to tax" and raises the issue of equal representation whether taxes are applied or not. Some people consider the purpose of the tax program - to make leading officials independent of colonial influence - as a dangerous violation of colonial rights. This is especially true in Massachusetts, the only colony where the Townshend program has been fully implemented.
Colonial merchants, some of them smugglers, played an important role in the protests. Because the Tea Law makes imported tea legally cheaper, it threatens to keep Dutch tea smugglers out of business. Legitimate tea importers who are not referred to as recipients by the East India Company are also threatened with financial ruin by the Tea Law. Another major concern for traders is that the Tea Law gives the East India Company a monopoly on tea trade, and it is feared this government-made monopoly may be extended in the future to include other items.
South Boston, demonstrators managed to force the recipients of tea to resign. In Charleston, the recipients were forced to resign in early December, and the unclaimed tea was confiscated by customs officials. There was a mass protest meeting in Philadelphia. Benjamin Rush urged fellow countrymen to oppose the tea landing, because the charge contained "seeds of slavery". In early December, Philadelphia taxpayers had resigned and tea ships returned to the UK with their cargo after a confrontation with the ship's captain. The tea vessel heading for New York City was delayed due to bad weather; by the time it arrived, the recipients had resigned, and the ship returned to England with tea.
Standoff in Boston
In every colony except Massachusetts, protesters were able to force tea recipients to resign or return tea to the UK. But in Boston, Governor Hutchinson is determined to defend his land. He assured the recipients of tea, two of whom were his sons, not to back down.
When the Dartmouth tea ship arrived in Boston Harbor in late November, Whig leader Samuel Adams called for a mass meeting to be held at Faneuil Hall on 29 November 1773. Thousands of people arrived, so much that the meeting was moved to the House Old South meetings are larger. British law requires Dartmouth to dismantle and pay duties within twenty days or customs officers can confiscate cargo (ie dismantle it to American soil). The mass meeting passed a resolution, introduced by Adams and based on a series of similar resolutions announced earlier in Philadelphia, urging Dartmouth captain to ship the ship back without paying import duties. Meanwhile, the meeting commissioned twenty-five men to oversee the vessel and prevent tea - including a number of chests from Davison, Newman and Co of London - to keep them from being lowered.
Governor Hutchinson refused to give permission for Dartmouth to leave without paying his obligations. Two more tea boats, Eleanor and Beaver, arrived at Boston Harbor (another tea ship to Boston, William , but it was stormy and ran aground on Cape Cod - where the tea cargo landed - before it could reach its destination). On December 16 - the last day of the deadline Dartmouth ' - about 7,000 people gathered around the Old South Meeting House. After receiving reports that Governor Hutchinson had refused again to let the ship leave, Adams announced that "This encounter can not do anything to save the country." According to popular stories, Adams's statement is a prearranged signal for "tea party" to begin. However, this claim did not appear in the print media until nearly a century after the incident, in Adams's biography written by his great-grandchild, who mistakenly interpreted evidence. According to eyewitnesses, people did not leave the meeting until ten or fifteen minutes after Adams allegedly "signaled", and Adams in fact tried to stop people going because the meeting was not over.
Tea Destruction
While Samuel Adams tries to reassert control of the meeting, people leave the Southern Old Meetinghouse to prepare for action. In some cases, this includes wearing a Mohawk costume that is prepared in detail. While disguising their individual faces is a necessity, because of the illegality of their protests, dressed as Mohawk warriors is a specific and symbolic option. This shows that the Sons of Liberty is identified with the Americans, above their official status as subjects of Great Britain.
That afternoon, a group of 30 to 130 men, some dressed in Mohawk soldiers' costumes, boarded three ships and, for three hours, threw all 342 chests into the water. The exact location of Wharf's website at Tea Party Griffin has been experiencing prolonged uncertainty; a comprehensive study puts it near the foot of Hutchinson Street (Pearl Street today).
Reaction
Whether Samuel Adams helped to plan a Boston Tea Party was moot, but he soon worked to publish and defend it. He argues that the Tea Party is not a lawless mafia act, but a principled protest and the only remaining option people have to defend their constitutional rights.
By "constitution" he refers to the idea that all governments have a constitution, written or otherwise, and that the constitution of Great Britain may be interpreted as the prohibition of taxation without representation. For example, Bill of Rights 1689 stipulates that long-term taxes can not be levied without Parliament, and another precedent says that Parliament must actually represent the people it orders, to "count".
Governor Thomas Hutchinson has urged London to take a hard line with the Sons of Liberty. If he had done what the other governor had done and allowed the owner of the ship and the captain to solve problems with the colonists, Dartmouth , Eleanor and Beaver > will go without breaking any tea.
In England, even those politicians regard colonists as shocked and this act unites all the parties there against the colonies. Prime Minister Lord North said, "Whatever the consequences, we have to risk something, otherwise it will end." The British government feels this action can not be taken for granted, and responded by closing Boston's port and placing another law known as "Coercion." Benjamin Franklin stated that the crushed tea had to be paid, all ninety thousand pounds (which, at two shillings per pound, reached £ 9,000, or £ 1.05 million [2014, approx $ 1.7 million US]). Robert Murray, a New York merchant, went to Lord North with three other merchants and offered to pay the loss, but the offer was rejected.
The incident produced a similar effect in America when news of the Boston Tea Party reached London in January and Parliament responded with a series of acts known collectively in the colonies as the Story of Not Intolerant. It was meant to punish Boston for the destruction of private property, restore British authority in Massachusetts, and instead reform the colonial government in America. Although the first two, the Boston Harbor Act and Massachusetts Government Act, apply only in Massachusetts, the colonists outside the colony fear that their current government may also be altered by the legislative fiat in Britain. The Unsolicited Deed is seen as a violation of the constitutional rights, natural rights and colonial charter, and united many colonists across America, exemplified by the calling of the First Continental Congress in September 1774.
A number of colonists were inspired by the Boston Tea Party to perform similar acts, such as the burning of Peggy Stewart . The Boston Tea Party has finally proven to be one of the many reactions that led to the American Revolutionary War. In 17 December 1773 the entry in his diary, John Adams wrote:
Last night 3 Bohea Tea Deliver emptied into the Sea. This morning is the Man of War screen.
This is the most extraordinary movement. There is Dignity, Your Majesty, Sublimity, in this Patriot's Last Effort, which I greatly admire. The people should never rise, without doing anything to remember - something important and conspicuous. Destruction This tea is so brave, so brave, so hard, brave and inflexible, and it must have such an important, and so lasting consequence, that I can not regard it as an Epocha in History.
There was a repeat performance on 7 March 1774, but it was much less damaging.
In February 1775, the United Kingdom passed a Consiliative Resolution, ending taxation for each colony which was satisfactorily provided for imperial defense and the maintenance of imperial officials. The tea tax is lifted with the Taxation of Colonies Act 1778, part of another parliamentary effort on failed conciliation.
Legacy
John Adams and many other Americans consider drinking tea as unpatriotic following a Boston Tea Party. Drinking tea declined during and after the Revolution, resulting in a shift to coffee as a preferred hot drink.
According to historian Alfred Young, the term "Boston Tea Party" did not appear in print until 1834. Before that time, the event was usually referred to as "the destruction of tea". According to Young, American writers over the years seem reluctant to celebrate the destruction of property, and therefore events are usually ignored in the history of the American Revolution. However, this began to change in the 1830s, especially with the publication of the biography of George Robert Twelves Hewes, one of the few surviving "tea party" participants, who came to be known.
The problem is never tax but how the tax is passed without American input; The United States Congress taxed tea from 1789 to 1872.
The Boston Tea Party is often used as a reference in other political protests. When Mohandas K. Gandhi led the massive burning of Indian registration cards in South Africa in 1908, a British newspaper compared the event to the Boston Tea Party. When Gandhi met the young king of England in 1930 after the Indian salt protest campaign, Gandhi took some duty-free salt from his scarf and said, with a smile, that the salt was "to remind us of the famous Boston Tea Party."
American activists from various political perspectives have called the Tea Party a symbol of protest. In 1973, on the 200th anniversary of the Tea Party, a mass meeting at Faneuil Hall called for the impeachment of President Richard Nixon and protested against oil companies in the ongoing oil crisis. Afterwards, protesters boarded a replica ship in Boston Harbor, hung Nixon in a statue, and dumped some empty oil drums into the harbor. In 1998, two conservative US congressmen put the federal tax code into a "tea" trunk and dumped it into the harbor.
In 2006, a libertarian political party called "Boston Tea Party" was founded. In 2007, Ron Paul's "Tea Party" money bomb, held on the 234th anniversary of Boston Tea Party, broke the one-day fundraising record by collecting $ 6.04 million in 24 hours. Furthermore, this "Tea Party" fundraiser grew into a Tea Party movement, which dominated politics over the next two years, culminating in a vote victory for Republicans in 2010 that was widely elected to seats in the United States House of Representatives.
Boston Tea Party Ship and Museum
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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