Which 1773 protest saw colonists throw taxed tea into Boston Harbor?

The Boston Tea Party was the 1773 protest in which colonists threw taxed tea into Boston Harbor.

On the night of December 16, 1773, a group of colonists boarded ships belonging to the East India Company and dumped hundreds of chests of tea into the harbor. The protest opposed the Tea Act and the broader principle that Parliament could tax colonists without their consent.

The Tea Act did not simply impose a new tea tax; it allowed the financially troubled East India Company to sell tea directly to the colonies. Many colonists feared that accepting the company’s tea would imply acceptance of Parliament’s taxing authority.

Britain responded with the Coercive Acts, called the Intolerable Acts by many colonists. These measures punished Massachusetts and helped encourage intercolonial cooperation, including the First Continental Congress in 1774.