Episode 040: The Boston Tea Party

American Revolution Podcast

Michael Troy

History, Education

4.8 • 1.1K Ratings

🗓️ 15 April 2018

⏱️ 20 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Parliament tries to win the fight over tariffs by greatly reducing the cost of tea, and maintaining only a nominal three pence per pound tax on tea. Officials hope the lower prices will end the tea boycott. Radical colonial leaders see this, correctly, as London's attempt to establish that tariffs on imports to raise revenue are legal. Patriots are caught off guard as the tea arrives only weeks after they learn about the terms. Officials think they have beaten the protesters. Once the ships enter the harbor, the tax must be paid. Otherwise, customs can seize the tea 20 days. On Dec. 16, 1773, the day before the tax is due, colonists dressed as Indians storm the three ships, break open the crates, and dump the tea into the harbor. A crowd of thousands, along with the British army and navy, stand by and watch. For more text, pictures, maps, and sources, please visit my site at AmRevPodcast.Blogspot.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	You're listening to an airwave media podcast. Below and thank you for joining the American Revolution.
0:17.0	Today, episode 40, the Boston Tea Party.
0:22.0	We left off last week with seven tea-laden ships headed for the colonies in the fall of 1773.
0:30.2	Lord North seemed to think he was going to put an end to the years of nonsense by forcing the colonies to accept parliamentary taxes once and for all.
0:39.0	He had minimized the amount of tax to a mere three pence per pound of tea. By removing all the other taxes and many other
0:46.8	costs that had been paid in transit, the price of tea was cheaper than ever before. In some cases cheaper or at least competitive with
0:55.6	smuggled tea from Holland. The non-importation agreements in place now for nearly four
1:01.3	years had been faltering on their own. These cheaper prices
1:05.8	would surely break colonial resistance and get trade back to normal.
1:11.0	But as any parent of a three-year-old knows, even if you have all the power and think you have all the carrots and sticks in place to compel certain behavior, the three-year-old can still throw a crazy tantrum that upsets all of your
1:26.4	plans and forces you to overreact. And that's pretty much what's about to happen.
1:32.6	The Patriots had relatively little time to react to all of this.
1:36.7	Parliament passed the T Act in May 1773.
1:41.0	Since it took nearly two months for where to reach the colonies, it was the middle of summer before anyone had heard about it in America.
1:48.0	Even then, there was considerable confusion about the details.
1:52.0	Some reports said that Parliament had removed
1:55.1	all duties, which of course would have been a great victory for the Patriots.
1:59.2	Not until early September did colonial newspapers publish the full text of the Act,
2:05.2	making clear that duties would still apply to T.
2:08.6	By August, the East India Company had already designated consignees and was rounding up ships to carry the tea to the colonies.
2:17.0	In late September, the ships had set sail.
2:20.0	By the time Patriots received a clear understanding of the T-A-X details, there was no time to send a response to England before the ships were in transit.
	...

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