I’ve noticed a rise in misuse of the Boston Tea Party on right side of the body politic. The incident was the direct result of a government BUSINESS TAX CUT to assist a favored company in undercutting the prices of competitors. Unless you are protesting tax cuts, especially business tax cuts, you really should avoid invoking this event.
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Hooray for Bryan! You are among the very few I’ve ever met who knows the true details behind the Boston Tea Party. The British were lowering the tax on tea. This threatened the income of smugglers like John Hancock, whose black market tea was super-competitive with legally imported tea.
Viz: “In May of 1773 Parliament concocted a clever plan. They gave the struggling East India Company a monopoly on the importation of tea to America. Additionally, Parliament reduced the duty the colonies would have to pay for the imported tea. The Americans would now get their tea at a cheaper price than ever before. However, if the colonies paid the duty tax on the imported tea they would be acknowledging Parliament’s right to tax them. Tea was a staple of colonial life – it was assumed that the colonists would rather pay the tax than deny themselves the pleasure of a cup of tea. “
I cheat, my people have been on this side of the Pond since the 17th century, so this is family history for me. They were in the first wave and none were Puritans, but they could write and pass along information. I also originally went to university to become a high school social studies teacher.
It is annoying the number of people who conflate “no taxation without representation” with the Tea Party which wasn’t an universally popular event, even in Massachusetts, well Granby, Massachusetts anyway.